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PRESS RELEASE: 28 October 2005

New style ‘health check’ national assessment for hospital

Addenbrooke’s has today published its first ever self-assessment (or draft declaration) on its performance over the period April to September 2005.

In line with all other NHS organisations in the country, Addenbrooke’s will now be assessed on its performance by the Healthcare Commission using this new system of self-assessment based on 24 core standards in hospital care. All NHS organisations are publishing a draft declaration for the period April to September 2005.

The new annual ‘health check’, which replaces the old star-rating system, has a self-assessment section which will concentrate on a broader range of issues and will aim to ‘measure what matters’ to patients, the public, clinicians and healthcare managers.

It will present a more accurate picture of performance and will for the first time reflect the views of the local community by including patient and public representatives in judging the quality of services.

The draft declaration published today details the hospital’s performance against a national set of 24 core standards which fall into seven categories: safety, clinical and cost effectiveness, governance, patient focus, accessible and responsive care, care environment and amenities and public health.

The hospital has made a declaration of performance against these standards, stating whether it has complied, not complied or whether there is insufficient assurance about the performance on the standard. From this declaration the Healthcare Commission will at the end of March 2006 give the hospital a peformance rating which will indicate whether our services are excellent, good, fair or weak.

Addenbrooke’s first declaration records compliance against the 24 core healthcare standards (each of which have several different sections) as follows:

38 responses where the Trust is compliant
one response where the Trust is non-compliant
five responses where the Trust has insufficient assurance

Speaking about the first declaration, Frances Cousins, Director of Corporate Management said: “We welcome this new initiative which will give our patients, staff and the public a much more detailed and relevant appraisal of how the hospital is performing.

“The declaration has taken into account the view of our partners in healthcare and very importantly the views of our governors who represent the 22,000 strong membership of the hospital. The declaration shows the Trust to be compliant with 38 of the standards which is testimony to the hard work and dedication of our staff. Five of the areas (including training, health promotion, healthcare policy, use of medical equipment and skills updating) showed we have more work to do to achieve a good standard. We have processes and systems in place, but need to do more work to evidence performance against the standard.

“The one standard where we do not have compliance relates to infection control in the hospital. This is not a new issue for us and significant work has been undertaken to reduce infection rates including our Take 5 initiative promoting standards for infection control, the Together we can fight infection campaign, the installation and promotion of gel dispensers for hand cleaning, the use of disposable curtains on wards. We understand this issue is of great importance to our patients and we will be exploring every avenue and working hard to achieve a better standard.”

Notes to editors
As this is the first year for this new-style assessment, all healthcare organisations are producing their first declaration in October as a ‘draft declaration’ in order to assess the way the new system works and make any necessary changes. The final declaration on which the Healthcare Commission will give our performance rating will be completed in March. This assessment will then take place annually.

More detailed information about the new system and a copy of Addenbrooke’s first declaration can be found at http://www.addenbrookes.org.uk/trust/perform/Health_Check.html

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For further press/media information contact: PR & Communications Department, Box 53, Addenbrooke's Hospital, Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, Hills Road, Cambridge CB2 2QQ; Tel: 01223 274 433; Fax: 01223 257 143; Minicom: 01223 274 604.