Friday brief: Northampton General must make rapid improvements to emergency department after inspectors visit
Our regular end of the week news round up
Northampton General Hosptial has been told to make rapid improvements after inspectors visited and found significant safety issues and corridor care.
An unannounced inspection at the end of February has led to the hospital receiving a section 29a notice, which is an official warning, that will keep the hospital under the watch of inspectors until June.
Care Quality Commission inspectors had considered the more serious section 31 notice, which could have led to enforcement action, but after hospital bosses submitted an action plan, they have said they will hold off on enforcement action for now.
The inspection was revealed in board papers from last Friday’s meeting of the University Hosptials Group and will be discussed next week by the integrated health board, which is holding weekly oversight meetings with the hospital.
The papers from last Friday’s board meeting say:
“On 27 February, the Trust received a letter indicating potential enforcement action under Section 31 of the Health and Social Care Act. A comprehensive high-level action plan was submitted in response on 28 February. On 11 March, the CQC confirmed that no urgent enforcement action would be taken at this stage. However, enforcement action is still under consideration, and we are continuing to implement our short- and medium-term actions.
“High-level feedback received regarding urgent and emergency care services from the CQC following their unannounced inspection, focused on 3 areas of concern: 1. Potential of harm to patients in the emergency department. 2. Hospital flow. 3. Privacy and dignity of patients.”
The hospital says it has made some immediate changes including increasing staffing and regularly assessing the risk of patients who are waiting. It is also now allocating beds based on the length of time people have been waiting in the department and using private rooms for consultations. Patients being looked after in corridors will also be visited more frequently and beds set up in the resus corridor have been closed down.
Northampton and its sister hospital in Kettering are led by group chief executive Richard Mitchell, who also oversee’s Leicester’s general hospitals. Last autumn Laura Churchward took over the chief executive role for Northampton general.
The hospital was predicting it would be £20m over budget at the end of the 2024/25 financial year.
It will be a significant time of change in Northants NHS landscape in coming months. The health board has also been told to by the government to cuts its costs by 50 per cent, which will undoubtedly lead to restructuring and job losses.
News in brief
Updated plans to build a new residential neighbourhood in Daventry have been approved. The 114-home development will be located on land at Farnborough Drive in the Middlemore estate which has been allocated for a housing project for the past 27 years.
Developers Stonebond Properties Ltd were previously forced to put the project on hold after West Northamptonshire Council (WNC) decided to defer the plans over fears the designs would provide “second-rate” homes. The revised plans came back to the same planning committee on April 2 after council officers renegotiated improvements to the scheme.
A number of alterations were agreed upon in response to members’ concerns, including the provision of two play areas within the estate and increased garden space and balconies for tenants living in flats. Other concerns about parking spilling out of the estate into other roads were not addressed as developers said there are no ‘clear locations’ to alter the provision.
WNC planning officers recommended that members approve the plans, writing that it is an improvement compared to previous iterations.
Committee members voted to green-light the housing project at the meeting last week. A financial contribution of £509,000 to educational services and the National Health Service must also be agreed within section 106 developer contributions before development begins.
Report by Nadia Lincoln, local democracy reporter
Northants Police has made three arrests after a 16-year-old was seriously assaulted in Weedon Road, Northampton, on Sunday.
The boy remains in hospital after the attack which happened in daylight hours between 4.45pm and 5.30pm.
Two 16 year old boys and another aged 15 have been arrested on suspicion of attempted murder and released on conditional bail, pending further enquiries.
Anyone with information can call the force on 101 or alternatively call Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555111.
A planning inspector has approved a large logistics hub to be built on the outskirts of a Northamptonshire town despite thousands of objections from local people. The government’s planning inspectorate decided to back developer DHL after a nine-day public inquiry into the controversial warehouse zone plans.
The logistics giant was initially refused permission by West Northamptonshire Council (WNC) for a 75-acre warehouse development on the edge of Towcester, at a tense planning meeting in September 2024. The company fought against the decision and launched an appeal with the planning inspectorate earlier this year.
Barristers representing DHL, WNC and the campaign group Save Towcester Now presented their arguments for and against the site at a public inquiry in February. After reviewing the evidence, a decision to allow the appeal was issued by Government-appointed inspector Malcolm Rivett last Friday.
The developers now have permission to build an 18.5m tall DHL warehouse, covering about 265,000 sq ft, as a centrepiece of the wider employment zone. Staff will access the site via a new roundabout on the A5, and improvements have also been proposed to the A5/A43 Tove Roundabout.
Outline planning permission has also been granted for three more employment zones on the site in the future. The orientation, number, and size of the B8 and B2 (storage, distribution, and industrial use) buildings on the other plots are yet to be confirmed.
Report by Nadia Lincoln
Plans for a new mortuary in Northampton have been criticised.
Health bosses have decided to shut down the mortuaries at the general hospitals in Kettering and Northampton and move them over to the new mortuary being built by West Northamptonshire Council in Booth Meadow on the Riverside Business Park.
The authority decided last January to spend £9.4m on the facility which would allow for post mortems for the coroner, as bodies were having to be sent out of county.
Kettering undertaker Tim Jones said the move would place additional emotional stress on families. The bodies of people who die in Kettering will be driven down the A43 to the mortuary. Stepnells, which developed the new market square in Northampton, has been awarded the mortuary contract by WNC.
Read the BBC report and the Northants Telegraph report here.