Monitor, the body that assesses and licences NHS hospitals has placed the Royal Berkshire Hospital on notice to improve its computer data handling, its governance and its financial plannng. In addition its progress in making the improvements demanded by the Care Quality Commission in June 2014 will continue to be monitored.
In a notice issued on 12th December 2014, Monitor recorded a number of undertaking made by the Royal Berkshire Hospital in response to earlier criticism.
Royal Berkshire Hospital had suspended reporting of the key RTT (referral to treatment) figures against the 18-week target claiming problems with data quality. In this it is not alone. Barts hospital in London, which also runs the Cerner Millennium hospital software used by RBH has also suspended RTT reporting for the same reason. It seems extraordinary that there is no nationally coordinated action on such problems with systems from a common supplier.
Royal Berkshire Hospital is also criticised for weaknesses in its financial planning - in particular concerning the costs of correcting failures to meet the 18-week referral to treatment target and concerning the costs of redundancies. This latter point must be of concern to both staff and patients as no indication is given of the nature of the redundancies in question.
As a further consequence weaknesses in governance are raised, and measures demanded to improve governance.
At a time when the hospital is coming under greatest pressure it must be difficult to find the spare effort to adapt and improve internal systems and attitudes. We can only wish the whole staff well with their programmes of improvement in quality, performance and governance.