Fairfield General Hospital has been ordered to improve by the healthcare watchdog after its latest inspection.

Care Quality Commission staff visited the Rochdale Old Road site, run by Northern Care Alliance NHS Foundation Trust (NCA), and gave it an overall score of "requires improvement".

Inspectors said not all staff completed mandatory training, the facilities and equipment were not always keeping people safe and the service did not always have enough nursing and medical staff to keep patients safe from avoidable harm and to provide the right care and treatment.

The report said: “Staff did not always identify patients at risk of deterioration.

“There was limited evidence that the medical division monitored the effectiveness of care and treatment and used the findings to make improvements and achieved good outcomes for patients.

“People could not always access the service when they needed it or received the right care promptly.

“Waiting times from referral to treatment and arrangements to admit, treat and discharge patients were not in line with national standards.

“Complaints were not always responded to within the timescales specified in the trust complaints policy.”

The urgent and emergency services were found to not have enough nursing and support staff with the correct qualifications, skills, training or experience to keep patients safe, the report added.

The amount of time patients had to wait for treatment was too long and staff didn’t always give pain relief in a timely manner.

But there were some positive aspects recorded.

The report said: “The service managed medicines well.

“Staff treated patients with compassion and kindness, respected their privacy and dignity, took account of their individual needs, and helped them understand their conditions.

“They provided emotional support to patients, families, and carers.”

When focusing on the safety of the service, the report highlighted that one of the main problems was that when the service provided mandatory training in key skills, not all staff completed it- this was particularly evident for resuscitation training.

The report said: “Staff received life support training for adults and children. However, training compliance rates for basic life support was 59 per cent.

“The nursing staff compliance rate for immediate life support was 48 per cent.

“The medical staff compliance rate for advanced life support was 64 per cent.”

In terms of safeguarding, there was a lack of training again which caused problems.

The report said: “Staff understood how to protect patients from abuse and the service worked well with other agencies to do so.

“However, not all staff had completed training on how to recognise and report abuse.

“Safeguarding training compliance for level one and two adults and children was 88 per cent.

“Nursing staff compliance for level three safeguarding adults and children was 75 per cent and medical staff compliance was 59 per cent.”

The effectiveness of the service was also rated as "requires improvement".

The report added: “There was limited evidence that the medical division monitored the effectiveness of care and treatment and used the findings to make improvements and achieved good outcomes for patients.”

The report stated that staff were competent in their roles but there were gaps in management and support arrangements for staff such as staff appraisals.

The rate of care the service gave was rated as "good" with the report stating that patients were treated with compassion and kindness, their dignity was respected, and their individual needs were taken into account.

This was the only part of the report that was rated "good" as the leadership and responsiveness of the service were both rated as "requires improvement" too.

Most staff said that the culture in the organisation was positive and was further strengthened by their teamwork.

However, stress and anxiety were the main reasons why staff were off sick.

Overall, staff and senior leaders at the hospital said they were committed to improving their services and quality improvement projects were taking place across the service.

NCA as a whole was given the overall ranking of "requires improvement" too.

In response, NCA chief executive Dr Owen Williams said: "The care and safety of patients and the wellbeing of our colleagues remain central to what we are about and we are determined to work together to get better results for the people we serve.

“We fully accept the CQC’s judgement and their recommended areas for improvement and as the CQC have acknowledged, some improvements are already being made but they do not go far enough at this moment in time.”

READ > Fairfield General Hospital's NHS trust told it must improve