The Christie Charity
Press release posted 3 October 2022
Patients at The Christie have given the internationally acclaimed cancer centre top marks once again for the quality of care.
In the results of the annual national inpatient survey, published by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) last week, The Christie performed ‘Much better than expected’ compared with other hospital trusts.
The 2021 inpatient survey shows how The Christie scored against other NHS trusts throughout England in a series of 47 questions that consider all aspects of the experience inpatients have when they are admitted to hospital. The survey was carried out amongst inpatients who were in hospital at The Christie between August and November 2021. It asked patients questions about hospital admission and discharge, the hospital and ward environment, care and treatment, their operations and procedures, communication with staff, involvement in decisions and being treated with respect and dignity.
Patients at The Christie gave the cancer centre a score of 9 out of 10 in the survey when asked what their overall experience was while they were in hospital, which was ‘much better than expected’ than other trusts’ in the survey. The lowest score by any trust for this question was 7.4, and the highest was 9.4.
In 4 of the survey questions, The Christie scored the same as the highest mark given to any trust in England. This was for the time patients had been on the waiting list before being admitted to hospital, receiving enough to drink, being given good information about their condition or treatment and patients feeling that staff told them who to contact if they were worried about their condition or treatment after they left hospital.
The Christie scored ‘much better than other trusts’ in 20 out of 47 questions and ‘better or somewhat better than other trusts’ in a further 21 out of 47 questions. On just 6 of the 47 questions, The Christie was ‘about the same as other trusts’, and in none of the questions was the cancer centre ‘worse than other trusts’.
Some of the main highlights from the survey were:
- Patients felt that their hospital room or ward was clean (Q8 scoring 9.7 out of 10)
- Patients strongly agreed that during their time in hospital they got enough to drink (Q15 scoring 9.9 out of 10)
- Patients had a lot of confidence and trust in the doctors treating them (Q17 scoring 9.7 out of 10)
- Patients felt very satisfied with the amount of information they were given about their condition or treatment (Q25 scoring 9.7 out of 10)
- Patients strongly agreed that they were given enough privacy when being examined or treated (Q28 scoring 9.7 out of 10)
- Patients were very satisfied that hospital staff told them who to contact if they were worried about their condition or treatment after they left hospital (Q43 scoring 9.7 out of 10)
- Patients felt very strongly that they were treated with respect and dignity in hospital (Q47 scoring 9.6 out of 10)
- Patients were very satisfied with the length of time they were on the waiting list before admission to hospital (Q2 scoring 9.2 out of 10)
Professor Janelle Yorke, executive chief nurse and director of quality at The Christie, said: “We strive to deliver the highest quality care and services for our inpatients and put patients at the heart of everything we do at The Christie.
“Listening to patient feedback through surveys like this and acting on the findings means we persistently do our utmost to provide the best inpatient experience possible. We are proud that our efforts are appreciated so much by our patients in surveys like this but are never complacent and are always looking for ways to improve.”
One Christie inpatient who had a very positive experience was Paul Ferriday, age 55, from Littleborough. He was originally diagnosed with testicular cancer in 2008 and had a recurrence in 2019. In March 2021 he had further abdominal surgery, involving an 8-hour operation at The Christie, and was an inpatient for 9 days afterwards.
Paul Ferriday said: “Nobody ever wants to be in hospital, but the experience I had as an inpatient at The Christie was very positive. I am not at all surprised that they have done so well in this patient survey, as I cannot fault the care and treatment I received. The staff were caring, companionate and professional at all times and treated me with respect and dignity.
The survey highlighted several areas where patient experience could be improved at The Christie, including the amount of noise and light at night when patients are sleeping, communication with patients, helping patients to understand their discharge information and asking patients for their views about the quality of care.
In total, 134 acute and specialist NHS trusts were surveyed, and responses were gathered from 62,235 patients.
The Christie had a response rate of 56% compared with the national response rate of 39%. There were 619 patients at The Christie who completed the survey.