Tameside General Hospital said maternity services needed improvement

Tameside General Hospital’s maternity service is said to need to improve waiting times, particularly in the antenatal clinic and on the triage phone line.

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) carried out an inspection in December 2023 as part of a national program and rated the maternity services at Tameside and Glossop Integrated Care NHS Foundation Trust as ‘requires improvement’.

Inspectors looked at areas that were safe and well-taught within the maternity service at Tameside General Hospital.

During this inspection, the inspector found the following:

• Some areas of the maternity ward were not clean and all staff had not completed infection prevention and control training.

• Staff did not always keep appropriate care records and they were not kept securely.

• The process of checking emergency equipment was not always effective, and the emergency trolley had expired or missing items.

• Not all relevant staff have completed level 3 adult safeguarding training.

• Staff did not always follow systems and processes for safely prescribing, storing, and administering medicines.

CQC did say the service had managed the safety incident appropriately and learned lessons from it, stating:

• Staff were proud to work for the service and felt respected, supported and valued.

• Managers monitored the effectiveness of the service and ensured that staff were competent.

CQC did not assess how effective, caring and responsive services were during this inspection, so ratings in these areas remained good.

The overall rating of the trust and Tameside General Hospital remains good.

Carolyn Jenkinson, Deputy Director of Secondary and Specialty Care, said:

“When we toured the maternity services at Tameside and Glossop Integrated Care NHS Foundation Trust, we found that our highly skilled staff are focused on the needs of women, the people who use our services and their babies.

“However, the standard of care provided has deteriorated since our last inspection and leaders must now focus on making the improvements that are needed.

“Despite leaders monitoring waiting times, they do not always ensure that people are seen in a timely manner, leading to delays in people receiving treatment after initial assessment. We were concerned about this.

“Staff said people, particularly those in antenatal clinics awaiting scan review in assessment units, could face long wait times for medical review.

“We also found that dedicated triage phones were not always answered by trained staff and could put people at risk if concerns were addressed by someone without the appropriate knowledge or skills. .

“We will continue to monitor the trust, including through future inspections, to ensure that the necessary improvements are made to ensure people receive safe and appropriate care.”

Tameside and Glossop Integrated Care NHS Trust said in a statement that it is working to improve the issues highlighted in the report.

“Tameside and Glossop Integrated Care NHS Foundation Trust accepts the CQC’s findings following the latest inspection of its maternity services.

“Their report confirmed our service’s willingness to learn and found that our staff take pride in working for our service.

“Our dedicated obstetric leadership team is currently working on a robust plan to address the areas for improvement identified by the CQC in order to deliver the highest quality of service to our community.”