Southport and Formby District General Hospital

Southport and Formby District General Hospital provides adult acute inpatient beds to approximately 224,402 people across Southport, Formby, and West Lancashire, as well as providing emergency and urgent care, critical care, outpatient diagnostic and rehabilitation services. It also provides the North West Regional Spinal Injuries Centre which delivers specialist care for spinal patients across the North West and the Isle of Man.

Southport and Ormskirk Hospital NHS Trust previously managed Southport and Formby District General Hospital. In July 2023 the Trust was acquired by St Helens and Knowsley Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust and it is now known as Mersey and West Lancashire Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust.

We carried out this unannounced, focused inspection because we received information giving us concerns about the safety and quality of the services.

We inspected the core services of medical care and Spinal Injuries Centre.

We did not rate these services at this inspection. We found:

• The service had enough nursing and medical staff to care for patients and keep them safe. Staff had training in key skills, understood how to protect patients from abuse, and managed safety well. Staff assessed risks to patients, acted on them and kept good care records.
• Staff provided effective care and treatment and gave patients enough to eat and drink.
• The service had policies and procedures in place to support staff and keep patients safe. Managers monitored the effectiveness of processes and made sure staff were competent.

However:

• Records were not always stored securely.
• The service did not have a 7-day dietetic or speech and language service.
• The service did not have enough dietitians or speech and language therapists.

How we carried out the inspection

We carried out an unannounced inspection (staff did not know we were coming) to enable us to observe routine activity. We carried out a focussed inspection of the core services of medical care and the Spinal Injuries Unit only.

5 inspectors carried out the inspection on the 24 January 2024 with support from an offsite operations manager. We spoke with 5 patients, 14 staff and reviewed 18 patient records. The inspection was overseen by Karen Knapton, Deputy Director of Operations.

You can find further information about how we carry out our inspections on our website: https://www.cqc.org.uk/what-we-do/how-we-do-our-job/what-we-do-inspection.