NHS trusts 'fail to hit' hygiene goals

More than one in four NHS trusts are failing to meet Government standards on hygiene.

A total of 103 NHS trusts out of 391 across England are unable to meet one or more aspects of the hygiene code, a health watchdog has warned.

They include 41 acute hospital trusts, 57 primary care trusts (PCTs), one ambulance trust and four mental health trusts.

The code is aimed at tackling hospital infections like MRSA and Clostridium difficile (C diff) and covers issues like decontaminating surgical equipment, cleaning wards and providing information to patients.

The Healthcare Commission issued a public warning over the failures, saying trusts have ten months to improve before a new regulator comes into force.

The new Care Quality Commission will require trusts to show they are compliant with regulations on hygiene. Those that fall short are likely face having conditions put on their registration.

Anna Walker, chief executive of the Healthcare Commission, said: "Our main message is not that we expect NHS trusts to be closed, but that there's ten months for these trusts to work very hard at bedding these hygiene code duties into place as they take on that extra legal bite of being registration requirements."

She said the Commission had tightened up regulations around decontaminating surgical equipment which could explain some of the non-compliance.

Of the 103 trusts declaring themselves non-compliant with at least one out of three standards in the hygiene code, 63 were non-compliant last year while 40 were newly non-compliant.

Ms Walker said:"Of those that are newly non-compliant, decontamination is the common thread."

But she stressed the importance of infection control, adding there was "room for a lot of improvement" across the 103 trusts.

While two out of three standards in the code had seen improvements, too many trusts overall were non-compliant.

She added: "We have got a national issue over infection prevention and control. We know from comparable data with other European countries that the UK has got something it's got to struggle with."

And she admitted it would be a "real failure" if any trust was unable to register with the new regulator because it could not meet standards on hygiene.

"What we are saying is this is a wake-up call," she said. "It's ten months before this formal registration."

The study is based on trusts self-reporting whether they believe they meet the Government requirements for the NHS.

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