Patients give Liverpool Cardiothoracic Centre top rating

May 14 2008 by Liza Williams, Liverpool Daily Post

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LIVERPOOL’S Cardiothoracic Centre is the best performing hospital trust in the north of England according to a survey questioning patients on their experiences.

The Healthcare Commission report questions patients in England on a wide range of issues, from cleanliness to how much respect they are given when they visit a hospital.

Several Merseyside Trusts have faired particularly well overall, including Liverpool Women’s Hospital and Clatterbridge.

But some other trusts faired less well on individual questions.

The Royal Liverpool and Broad-green came bottom in the country when patients were asked about food, with an average score of 37.86. The highest national score was 79.83.

Scores were exceptionally high at the Cardiothoracic Centre (CTC) in Broadgreen and stan-dards of overall care were rated as excellent or very good by 95% of respondents against a national average of 77%.

As many as 93% of patients also gave it top rating for being treated with dignity and respect against a national average of 78%. Clatter-bridge scored 92%.

The CTC also ranked in the low-est four Trusts for the amount of patients who said they felt threat-ened in hospital, and 99% of patients who said their room/ward was very or fairly clean.

CTC Chief Executive Raj Jain, said: “It is heart-warming that our patients have such confidence and trust in our staff and the ser-vices we provide. The results are fantastic news for our hospital.

“The hard work and dedication of our staff, volunteers and sup-porting organisations are the reasons why patients continue to receive excellent heart and chest care from this Trust and our thanks must go to everyone involved.

“We are very proud to be leading the country in cardiothor-acic care but we do not want to become compla-cent and will be looking at ways of continuing to improve the patient experience for all our patients.” The North West fared well but many Trusts performed poorly in other parts of the country. The biggest variations came on clean-liness, mixed-sex wards, help with eating meals and food quality.

Health Minister Ann Keen said: “The wide variation in patient experience across the NHS is unacceptable.

“Where Trusts and PCTs know they have more to do, we have asked them to set improvement goals.”

The survey covers 76,000 patients at 165 acute and specialist NHS trusts in England.

FOR full results go to http://www.health-carecommission.org.uk

lizawilliams