Making acute hospital care better in East

of England 2012

The full report is on the NHSEast of England web site: www.eoe.nhs.uk/learningdisability

How are hospitals doing at the moment?

There are 17 acute hospital Trusts in the east of England.

• all hospitals are doing some good things.

• A few hospitals are doing many good things.

• there are still a lot of things to improve.

• No hospital is doing very well overall.

Things that most hospitals are doing well.

• All the hospitals now have a learning disability liaison nurse except one which has a disability advisor.

• Most Trusts have a learning disability champion on some wards. A few Trusts have these champions on a lot of wards

• Most hospitals have got some easy read information available to people.

All the hospitals have got a group where people with a learning disability and family carers can give their views.

Things that hospitals need to do better.

• The senior people in Trusts should be getting regular information about how good their services are for adults with a learning disability and adults with autism.

• Hospitals should have ways of checking that adults with a learning disability/autism are getting the basic care they need. For instance, that people are eating and drinking enough. This is called ‘auditing’ people’s care.

• Hospitals and community services need to be better at planning with people and their families before they go into hospital.

• Training needs to be given to all staff. This might be different for some groups of staff depending on their job.

• Staff need more help to make ‘reasonable adjustments’ for people’s stay in hospital e.g. providing easy read letters and information, making sure the right equipment is there

Will hospital care get better? 2012-14.

• If all the hospitals make all the improvements they plan, then they will all be providing very good care for adults with a learning disability and adults with autism by 2014.