Inspection shows good, caring children’s services with areas for improvement

Inspectors from the Care Quality Commission (CQC) said that Sheffield Children’s community health services are good overall – matching the good ratings already held by Sheffield Children’s Hospital and Sheffield Children’s NHS Foundation Trust as a whole.

A variety of hospital services were also looked at and inspectors felt that good progress had been made in those aspects of the hospital’s work since the last inspection.

Meanwhile Sheffield Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) – both at the Becton site and community services – were rated as requiring improvement.

However all services provided in Sheffield for children were rated as “caring”.

Sally Shearer, Director of Nursing and Quality at Sheffield Children’s, said: “We welcome the positive comments in the report and the recognition of the caring services we provide.

“We agree there are areas where we can improve and we are putting plans in place to make sure we continue to make our services as good for patients and their families as possible.”

In total the CQC issued five reports about Sheffield Children’s services this week. Many aspects of the organisation’s work were praised, including how caring staff are, the cleanliness of departments, the child-friendly facilities, effective infection control and the strong reporting culture, with staff feeling able to speak up about concerns.

Positive comments about services from inspectors included:

• “People were treated with dignity, respect and kindness during all interactions with staff and relationships with staff were positive.”
• “We observed staff interacting with patients and saw staff explaining care and receiving consent. Staff worked in a child centred way.” (Hospital)
• “Services were planned to meet people’s needs and the needs of different people were taken in to account.” (Community services)
• “Children and their parents/representatives were actively engaged and involved in the decisions. Family members felt listened to by the management. Relatives and carers made positive comments about the culture on the unit.”(Critical care)
• “Staff told us they felt supported by their colleagues and management and felt valued in the organisation. They said they were happy to raise concerns and report incidents.” (Medical services)
• “Care and treatment was evidence based with policies, procedures and pathways available to staff. There was good evidence of multi-disciplinary working. (Community services)
• “Parents we spoke with said staff were caring, kind and professional. The majority spoke very highly of the service and the support their child received. Parents reported seeing positive changes in their child.” (Becton)
• “Staff reported incidents and took action as a result to improve safety of the children and the young people.” (Surgery)
• “We saw several areas of outstanding practice including the child and adolescent mental health service schools link pilot scheme (and) paediatric palliative care simulation training.”

The Trust is currently putting together an action plan for the areas where improvement is needed. This will include specific plans for mental health services, safeguarding, information sharing, staffing, transition, Deprivation of Liberty Standards and Duty of Candour.