Patient safety

Five trusts show consistently higher death rates in latest figures

Death rates have been higher than expected for two years running at five NHS trusts, according to new figures.

NHS Digital has published its latest list of Summary Hospital-level Mortality Indicator (SHMI) ratings for all English trusts.

They show that between July 2015 and June 2016, 11 trusts had a higher than expected rating. Of these, five were also outliers in July 2014 to June 2015 (listed below). Between January and December 2015, 15 trusts had a higher than expected SHMI and seven were outliers. Blackpool Teaching Hospitals and South Tyneside FTs and Wye Valley NHS Trust appeared on both lists.

Other trusts listed for a higher than average death rate included Pennine Acute, which has been rated as ‘inadequate’ by the CQC.

An internal review, which has since been revealed by the Manchester Evening News, found a series of “unacceptable situations” had taken place in the trust’s maternity services, including a premature baby dying in a sluice room and a woman dying from a “catastrophic haemorrhage” due to misdiagnosis.

Gloucestershire Hospitals FT, which has been placed in financial special measures by NHS Improvement, was also on the list.

On the other hand, 15 trusts had a lower than expected SHMI rating, of which eight also achieved this in the same period last year (listed below).

There were six trusts – Barts Health, Imperial College Healthcare and The Whittington Hospital NHS Trusts and Chelsea and Westminster, Guy’s and St Thomas’ and University College London FTs – that achieved a lower rating in the last set of figures as well.

Barts Health operates the troubled Whipps Cross University Hospital, which was recently rated inadequate by the CQC.

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