Boss defends staff and tells of progress

The former regional manager for the Healthcare Commission has said the new NHS watchdog has brought in a number of changes to monitor hospitals.

Andrea Gordon, who is now the regional director for the Care Quality Commission, was speaking at the Stafford Hospital inquiry about the changes that had been implemented since it was set up, and defended her inspectors, saying they were well-trained since the team was restructured.

Mrs Gordon revealed there were now eight compliance managers, and they each had 10 inspectors working for them since the CQC was reorganised in May 2010.

She said each would have around 50 to 55 organisations they assess — which included looking at the NHS, independent healthcare and adult social care.

In a previous appearance at the inquiry, she told chairman Robert Francis QC, they had not walked through the hospital during their visits or inspections, and did not have any contact with staff or patients during the time her staff visited Stafford Hospital in the summer of 2007.

It was a report by the Healthcare Commission that revealed "appalling" standards of care that may have contributed to the deaths of hundreds of patients.

However, yesterday she said they were careful to make contact with patients, staff and families during inspections. She had also previously said the Healthcare Commission was sure that the hospital's high death rate was due to a result of data problems.

But yesterday she said many changes had been made since the changeover to the CQC, and they were very involved with patients and staff, and had a better connection with other bodies, such as the Strategic Heath Authority and Monitor so they could "proactively share information".

In her statement, she said: "The relationship between CQC and the SHA at the regional level has improved over time, and I now consider it to be excellent." She also said there was better communication between the central and regional operations.

Mrs Gordon said inspectors, who now had a "general" caseload rather than a focus on one part of healthcare, had been given more training and also were "buddied up" with others with more experience. She said that by May her staff were "ready to embrace the new ways of working" and were "experts" at regulating "essential standards".