South East Coast Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust Issued a Warning Notice

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has told South East Coast Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust that it must make significant improvements in the quality of its services.

Following a comprehensive inspection in May, CQC has issued a Warning Notice identifying six main areas of concern for improvement by the trust:

• The systems in place to ensure enough staff are employed and deployed appropriately are not effective.
  •           NHS 111 calls are not always responded to in a timely and effective manner.
  •           Processes to ensure that equipment is properly maintained and secured are not adequate.
  •           Safeguarding processes to prevent abuse of service users are not operated effectively.
  •           The systems in place for medicines management are not operated safely and effectively.
  •           Governance arrangements including systems to assess, monitor and improve the quality and safety of the services are not operated effectively.

Julie Fitzgerald, Executive Director of Healthwatch East Sussex said:

“As the CQC state, local people who rely South East Coast Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust, are entitled to an ambulance service that is consistently safe, effective and responsive to their needs. The CQC have through their inspection found that patients were not receiving the quality of care that they are entitled to expect and that not all timescales are being met. It has told the Trust this must change, giving them until 10th September to address these immediate concerns.

“We recognise this news is likely to create anxiety for some local people and it is important going forward, that the Trust can demonstrate to the public that it provides a safe and effective service. We will be working closely with the Trust and our Healthwatch colleagues across the region to make sure this is the case and would ask anyone who has any concerns to get in touch with us 0333 101 4007 to share your experiences.

CQC will publish a full report of its inspection findings in the near future.”