'Distressed' patients found by hospital inspectors

NHS inspectors found unmonitored "distressed patients" during a hospital visit that raised safety concerns, a report has said.

St Mary's Hospital in Newport, the Isle of Wight's main hospital, was rated "good" overall by the Care Quality Commission (CQC).

However, its urgent and emergency care "requires improvement" due to long waiting times and patients left in "unsuitable" places, inspectors said.

Isle of Wight NHS Trust said it accepted the findings and was committed to improving.

Following the inspection in February, the CQC issued a warning notice about the management of patients in the emergency department.

Catherine Campbell from the commission said: "Inspectors were concerned that staff had limited visibility of the waiting room and wouldn't be able to respond quickly if people deteriorated.

"In fact, inspectors had to seek help for some distressed people during this visit."

Patients were not seen within four hours of arrival and some people had to wait more than 12 hours for a hospital bed, she said.

In some cases, access to patients in cubicles was blocked by other patients left on trolleys across the cubicle entrances, the CQC report found.

Campbell said: "Despite these safety concerns, we found signs of a positive culture.

"Staff worked well together... Leaders had also ensured staff felt comfortable raising concerns."

She said the warning notice had prompted remedial action.

Medical care at the hospital was found to be good, with a "positive learning culture", inspectors added.

Isle of Wight NHS Trust was previously rated "inadequate" for its quality of services from 2017 to 2019, before being taken out of special measures in 2021.

Its chief executive Penny Emerit said: "We fully accept the CQC's findings, which clearly identify areas where we need to make improvements at pace.

"None of us want patients to experience delays or uncertainty around their care and we were already taking steps to tackle this."