Our Approach to Quality

The people who use our services, and their carers and families, are at the heart of our quality strategy.

By listening to the communities we serve and understanding their experiences, we can provide a quality service involving them in their care in the ways they want.

Our stated purpose as an organisation is ‘To Make Life Better’. This is fully expressed in our commitment to develop the highest quality services that make genuine and meaningful differences to all those who use our services.

In England, an NHS Outcomes Framework has been developed and is made up of national outcome goals that measure overall quality in the NHS. Indicators in the NHS Outcomes Framework are grouped around five domains, which set out the high-level national outcomes that the NHS should be aiming to improve.

1. Preventing people from dying prematurely;
2. Enhancing quality of life for people with long-term conditions;
3. Helping people to recover from episodes of ill health or following injury;
4. Ensuring that people have a positive experience of care; and
5. Treating and caring for people in a safe environment; and protecting them from avoidable harm.

Service User Experience

You can view our latest CQC patient survey results here.

We are compliant with the National requirements for Mixed Sex Accommodation. Patient-Led Assessments of care Environment (PLACE) take place every year and are now led by local Healthwatch teams.

Safety

We have a strong focus upon reducing harm and keeping those who use our services safe. The following links provide more information:

• NHS Quality and Patient Safety Improvement Programme for Mental Health
• Infection Control including our policy.

Overall quality

Information on the overall quality of our services is provided below:

• The Care Quality Commission (CQC) are the independent regulators for all NHS bodies. Find Trust-related CQC information here.
• Our quality report can be viewed in our annual reports 

CQUINs

The national contractual use of CQUINs is to support the essential focus upon quality improvement in the provision of services and incentivise through specific quality payments.

A proportion of ²gether NHS Foundation Trust’s income each year is conditional on achieving quality improvement and innovation goals agreed between ²gether NHS Foundation Trust and Gloucestershire Clinical Commissioning Group, Herefordshire Clinical Commissioning Group and NHS South West Specialised Commissioning Group (for the provision of low secure mental health NHS services) and any person or body they entered into a contract, agreement or arrangement with for the provision of relevant health services, through the Commissioning for Quality and Innovation payment framework.

Ward Staffing

Find guidance from the NHS National Quality Board on staffing levels here.

Safe Staffing Levels

We publish our planned staffing numbers against what actually occurs each month.  You can view these here.