Last year, as Marlborough News Online reported, the NHS mental health trust that serves Wiltshire was criticised as being “centralist, top down, target driven, bureaucratic and controlling.”
Now the Avon and Wiltshire Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust (AWP) has been described as “open, honest, transparent, and supportive and focussed on the delivery of high quality care” by the same review team that had criticised it.
The independent review team was first commissioned to undertake a review of governance and management arrangements at AWP following concerns raised in two mental health homicide reviews.
In its 2012 report, the review team made a number of stark criticisms including, lack of clinical engagement, slow incident reporting to the National Patient Safety Agency, little evidence of constructive internal dialogue and concerns over some aspects of safety.
Following the 2012 report AWP’s former chairman stood down and the former chief executive retired.
The same review team was commissioned to assess progress over the past year. They have now described AWP as “completely different and unrecognisable from our previous visits in a very positive way.” The team’s main points are:
• The new Chief Executive and Chairman have succeeded in quickly changing the organisational culture from punitive to supportive.
• Clinical engagement is now evident through clinical directors and lead clinicians who feel involved in decision making and who value their newly gained autonomy to act.
• Recent organisational changes were completed quickly and effectively – enabling improvements in care quality not least by simplifying care pathways.
• The organisational restructuring has also clarified to external stakeholders who is the responsible person, the ‘go to’ person, when issues arise.
Welcoming publication of this new report the Trust’s new chief executive, Iain Tulley, said: “This report paints a very positive picture of the progress the Trust has made over the past twelve months. The key to this change has been a drive to simplify targets and benchmarks, and a determined focus upon patient care.”
“There remain many challenges ahead. We are not there yet but it is good to see that we are making progress and are on an improving trajectory.”
The latest progress report was jointly commissioned by the Trust and the NHS England Local Area Team for Bristol, North Somerset, Somerset and South Gloucestershire.
Anthony Farnsworth the Local Area Team Director said: “The Avon and Wiltshire Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust has made good progress over the past year and it’s encouraging to see that this has now been recognised.”
“I know the Trust board will not rest on their laurels but will redouble their efforts to ensure that they build on this progress and continue to make further improvements to patient care across Avon and Wiltshire.”
