Humber NHS Foundation Trust

Duty of Candour

A culture of openness, honesty and transparency

Occasionally people in our care are involved in a safety incident. A small number of these incidents cause harm.

When things go wrong, we have a duty to inform our patients and their families what has happened. This is very much part of our culture.

We are committed to talking to patients and their carers at a very early stage to understand what happened and, where necessary, learn the lessons that will prevent it happening again to improve the safety of our future patients.

Involving and informing you

If something happens, we will investigate the incident and:

• ask how much the patient and their relatives or carers wish to be involved in the investigation process;
• review the patient’s medical and nursing notes;
• talk to the staff involved in the patient’s care;
• identify the cause(s) of the incident;
• share our findings with the patient, their family or carers;
• share learning and improvements across the Trust;
• let the patient and their family or carers ask any questions.

A member of the investigation team will meet with the patient to talk to them about what went wrong. This will usually be the consultant or nurse looking after them. The patient’s family or a friend can attend this meeting and be part of these conversations.

The level of investigation we do will depend on the seriousness of the incident and may take up to 45 working days (nine weeks). We will keep the patient and their family informed of our progress along the way.

If you have any questions or want to raise a concern with the Trust then please contact Jules Williams, Care Quality Director on 01482 389135 or emailjules.williams1@nhs.net

Last updated on 16 April 2015.

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East Riding Addictions Services Praised by Health Watchdog

Services supporting people in the East Riding with drug and alcohol addictions have been praised by health watchdog, the Care Quality Commission.

CQC inspectors visited the services earlier this year and found a high standard of person-centred care delivered by a team of staff who are passionate about what they do.

Addictions Services in the East Riding have been provided since 2006 by a partnership between Humber NHS Foundation Trust, the Alcohol and Drugs Service and East Riding of Yorkshire Council.

Feedback from people who have used the service was very positive with one patient telling the CQC that the team had, “Made me feel better, thanks to everyone who helped me on the road to recovery”.

The team is working closely with GP practices to make the services even more accessible, particularly to young people, throughout the East Riding.

David Hill, Chief Executive of Humber NHS Foundation Trust, said he was delighted the CQC had highlighted the high quality of care.

“We are very pleased to see the CQC has noted the high standard of care which is assessed, planned and delivered around the individual, taking into account their needs and the needs of their families,” said Mr Hill. “This was also something that really came out in the feedback from people who have used the service.”

Inspectors found that addictions services were safe and effective with clear reporting procedures and systems in place to ensure staff could learn from any incidents that occurred. The report highlights staff morale is very high and that teams work well together with staff, feeling supported by their colleagues and management. CQC inspectors also praised the facilities which were well-maintained, safe and secure.

Dr Tim Allison, Director of Public health for the East Riding, said: “This is well deserved recognition of a high quality service for both drug and alcohol users.  The East Riding has been a top performing area for five years now and part of this success has been the good working relationship between Humber, ADS and our commissioning team.”

Tim Young, Chief Executive of the Alcohol and Drugs Service (ADS) said: “I am pleased the CQC has recognised the high standard of service and the staff involved are rightly proud of their achievements. Most importantly though, our service users, their families and the communities in the East Riding have benefitted from a high quality service which brings together the best of the NHS and third sector by working in partnership.”

You can read the full report here.

Last updated on 20 November 2014.

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Trust and its partners welcome the outcome of CQC inspection of Humber NHS Foundation Trust

David Hill, Chief Executive of Humber NHS Foundation Trust, welcomed reports published by the CQC.

“A team of 55 inspectors visited 15 different service areas over 71 different sites in April this year. The reports published today show the extremely high levels of compassionate care being delivered by staff in every single area of the Trust. Feedback from the CQC alongside comments from patients and carers also shows the overwhelming majority of our services are effective and have a positive effect on the lives of the people who use them.

“We are grateful the CQC acknowledges the team of remarkable professionals this Trust is fortunate enough to have delivering care to the people of Hull and the East Riding of Yorkshire.

“The report does highlight that there were areas for improvement, something we were aware of and work constantly to improve. We are grateful the CQC recognises the high quality of our care environments contributes to good outcomes for patients. However, standards constantly improve and the Trust needs to ensure it is not only always aware of new developments but continues to have investment ready so it can act when patient environments need to meet new standards.

“7 essential improvements detailed in the reports were flagged by the CQC at the time of the inspection and we either put these right or immediately started to make improvements. We will use the feedback from the CQC to continue to work with our staff and partners to create even more responsive, patient-centred services.”

The reports highlight issues around the length of time people sometimes have to wait for our services, particularly Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services. Together with our local commissioners and the local authorities, we had already recognised that the quality of our CAMHS services were not good enough even before the CQC inspection. At the time of the inspection, we had just begun a major transformation of the service which was less than a month into delivery and the report released today reflects the situation as it was in May. Since the inspection and ahead of receiving the reports, we have continued to make improvements and these include running Saturday morning clinics to reduce waiting times. There are clearly still areas we can improve on and we will continue to work closely with our partners to improve services for children, young people and their families across the East Riding.

Sharon Mays, Chairman of the Trust, said the organisation had been through significant change this year with a new chair, Chief Executive, Director of Nursing, Medical Director, Finance Director and Director of Human Resources.

“The new team welcomes the feedback from the CQC which will enable us to improve on the good situation we have inherited,” said Mrs Mays.

Hilary Gledhill, Director of Quality & Governance, NHS East Riding of Yorkshire CCG commented:

“We are pleased to see the CQC report has a lot of positives. The inspection found that staff are caring and a high level of quality care is being delivered.

“We do recognise however, as does the Trust, that there are areas for development and work to be done. The report gives a good platform for the CCG to work with David Hill, Chief Executive and his team to take on board the recommendations and drive forward improvements in health services throughout East Riding to ensure all our residents receive great quality care.”

Sarah Smyth, Director of Quality and Clinical Governance/Executive Nurse for NHS Hull CCG, said:

“As the commissioner of mental health services for Hull, we are very encouraged by the examples of high quality, compassionate care highlighted in the report.

“We recognise the issues highlighted around CAMHS reflect the position at the time of the inspection in May. Six months on from the launch of the city’s Children and Young People’s Mental Health and Wellbeing Strategy, the new CAMHS service is beginning to make a real difference to young people in Hull.”

Last updated on 06 October 2014.

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Team work & good practice at Hawthorne Court

Team work and good practice at Hawthorne Court has meant the unit has achieved AIMS accreditation with Excellence for the second time.

AIMS (Accreditation for Inpatient Mental Health Services) is the Royal College of Psychiatry mark of good practice. It is a rigorous, standards-based accreditation programme designed to guarantee a high quality of care in inpatient mental health wards.

Gill Lowe, Charge Nurse at the Beverley inpatient rehabilitation unit, said this was about the whole multi-disciplinary team going over and above to ensure continuing excellent patient care.

“I’d like to thank the whole team for their continued hard work and excellent practice,” said Gill. “Re-accreditation assures staff, service users and carers, commissioners and regulators of the continuing high quality of the service being provided at the unit. To achieve the accreditation again with excellence demonstrates just how high our standards are.”

Humber NHS Foundation Trust Chief Executive David Hill said, “Achieving AIMS accreditation with excellence for the second time is really something to be proud of. It shows that our teams are consistently providing the highest standards of care and treatment to our most vulnerable patients.”

Last updated on 07 August 2014.

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Staffing Information Published on Our Website

This year, hospitals in England will start to publish information about how many nursing staff are working on their wards or inpatient units every month. 

This is part of the NHS response to the Francis report which said patients and their families needed a lot more information about how hospitals were being managed and run.

Humber NHS Foundation Trust takes the care of the people who use our services very seriously and we already have a number of mechanisms in place to make sure there are enough nurses on our wards and units to ensure they run safely.

We have created a new webpage to highlight key information about our staffing levels. You can visit this page at www.humber.nhs.uk/saferstaffing.htm. 

A full explanation of what staffing data means is included in a paper which will go to our Trust Board meeting every month where the staffing levels will be discussed. If units have been unable to meet planned staffing levels we will look at the reasons why and what actions have been taken. 

You will be able to find links to the Board Paper on our Safer Staffing page.

Other Information about staffing on our wards

As patients, visitors and staff enter each of our 24 wards or inpatient units, they are able to see a board that displays the planned and actual numbers of staff working there each day. The boards show who is in charge of the shift and when the information was last updated.

Last updated on 24 June 2014.

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Check out what we're doing

For all our latest news, please visit www.humber.nhs.uk, follow us on twitter @HumberNHSFT or like us on Facebook www.facebook.com/HumberNHSFT

Last updated on 22 May 2014.

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