Kidderminster Hospital and Treatment Centre

On this page

• Overview
• Shared direction and culture
• Capable, compassionate and inclusive leaders
• Freedom to speak up
• Workforce equality, diversity and inclusion
• Governance, management and sustainability
• Partnerships and communities
• Learning, improvement and innovation

We assessed 7 quality statement from this key question. We have combined the score for this area with scores based on the rating from the last inspection, which was requires improvement. Our rating for this key question has improved and is now good.

This service scored 75 (out of 100) for this area. Find out what we look at when we assess this area and How we calculate these scores.

Staff told us they enjoyed working within children and young people’s services. Staff told us the culture was focused on children, young people and their families, and they had the opportunity to develop and progress in their career.

The paediatric directorate had a strategy for 2023 to 2026 (for the entire trust), which was developed in October 2023 with all relevant stakeholders with the safe care and needs of children and their families central to it. The vision and strategy were aligned to local plans within the wider health economy. There were plans in place for Kidderminster Hospital and Treatment Centre to increase the number of daycase procedures performed on children, reduce paediatric surgery waiting times and for it to become an elective centre for the trust. The service had an open culture with appropriate processes in place for children, young people, their families and staff to raise concerns without fear.

Leaders had a genuine commitment to improve children and young people’s experience, care and treatment. Leaders of the children and young people’s services included senior clinicians and managers. There was positive work between partner organisations and commissioners to improve services to meet children and young people’s needs. Staff felt supported by their leadership team. Leaders were available when needed and led by example. Leaders focused on staff wellbeing and ensured a culture which promoted good practice, good quality and safe patient care. Leaders and managers supported staff, and staff we spoke with were clear on their individual roles and responsibilities.

The service had managers at all levels with the right skills and abilities to run a service providing high-quality sustainable care. Clinical leaders were visible across children’s services. Leaders had effective support opportunities to develop and maintain their credibility and skills. Staff had opportunities to develop including for future leadership roles. There was inclusive recruitment and succession planning. The trust had effective recruitment processes and ongoing checks to ensure all staff met legal requirements to work in the trust. Staff and managers across the service promoted a positive culture that supported and valued one another. Managers met with staff regularly to complete appraisals and performance reviews.

Staff told us there was a positive culture and they could approach leaders if they had any concerns. Staff told us they were cooperative, supportive, and appreciative with each other. The trust had 1 ‘Freedom to Speak Up Guardian’ and ‘Freedom to Speak Up Champions’. Staff told us they knew how to contact the freedom to speak up team. A Freedom to Speak Up Guardian is a named person in every hospital trust who provided independent support and advice to staff who wanted to speak up and hold the board to account it failed to focus on the patient safety issue. There was a process for staff to follow if they wanted to use the freedom to speak up service, information about this was available on the trust intranet. Staff said they felt able to raise concerns without fear of retribution. Managers and staff apologised and responded quickly with candour when things went wrong. People were meaningfully involved in implementing actions to prevent reoccurrence.

There were several ways for staff at Kidderminster Hospital and Treatment Centre to raise concerns. Staff were encouraged to raise concerns directly with their line manager or clinical lead. The Trust also hosted a monthly “Exec Live” forum where staff could ask questions to Executive team members, and an online “Rumour Mill” process was in place for staff to ask questions and receive responses via the Trust’s intranet page. A bi- annual freedom to speak up report was presented to the trust board. The report contained details on the number of people who had raised concerns on the types of concerns that had been raised. Concerns could be raised anonymously when people did not want to disclose their personal details.

The service promoted equality and diversity in daily work and provided opportunities for career development. Staff told us equality and diversity were promoted and they felt they were treated equitably regardless of any protected characteristics. Supported by the trust, leaders championed diversity and understood it was integral to a positive, inclusive, and high performing workforce. Staff we spoke with told us they did not experience bullying or harassment including those with protected characteristics under the Equality Act.

The services supported workforce equality and diversity as part of its staff performance and development reviews (PDR). The PDR included a career framework and a conversation where staff could see themselves going forward a discussion about training and development and working practices to support staff (such as set days and flexible working). Processes included new staff who had a meeting at 3 months to set objectives and identify where they wanted to go in their careers.

Leaders monitored the quality of services provided, activity, performance and used data to identify areas for improvement.

The service had systems for identifying risks, planning to eliminate or reduce them, coping with both the expected and unexpected. The service collected, analysed, managed and used information to support all its activities. The paediatric directorate risk register identified risks and actions being undertaken to mitigate against the risk. The trust’s children and young people’s service had an established governance process that was appropriate for their service and was across all sites where children’s services were delivered. There were a range of regular meetings held between managers and staff, managers and senior managers which identified and discussed clinical concerns, performance and emerging risks. Managers clearly recorded any actions arising from these meetings and ensured they shared these with staff. Staff could access all required policies and procedures. Staff took patient confidentiality and information security seriously.

Staff and managers were passionate to provide high quality and accessible services for children. Managers told us about how they had worked with other services to ensure this and has been detailed throughout this report .

Commissioners and other partners positively identified how the trust’s children and young people’s service worked to develop and improve access to care and treatment closer to home. This included the extension of the elective surgery for children, a regional children’s surgery service, and access for GPs to gain advice from consultant paediatricians.

There were systems in place for the service to engage with children, young people, their families and carers who used the service, staff, the public and local organisations to plan and manage services with the collaboration of partner organisations.

Staff and managers were committed to learning and improving services. Leaders encouraged innovation to develop and improve the services and the experience of children and young people within the trust.

There were systems in place, across the service, to support improvement and innovation work, including objectives and rewards for staff, data systems, and processes for evaluating and sharing the results of improvement work. Leaders and managers shared learning across children and young people services.