HOSPITALS watchdog the Care Quality Commission has issued a third warning notice to the under-fire James Paget University Hospital in Gorleston.

Inspectors visited the JPH on March 1 and found ‘do not attempt resuscitation’ (DNAR) orders were not always completed with appropriate information, some medical records were not up to date and contained anomalies, care plans did not always cater to a patient’s individual needs and the trust was not taking proper steps to ensure patients were protected from the risks of receiving unsafe treatment.

CQC inspectors have been to and from the JPH since a failed inspection into dignity and nutrition standards a year ago.

And they had been visiting last month to check on what progress had been made in relation to concerns raised with the trust at the time of an earlier inspection.

The latest formal warning rules that the JPH must improve standards of care or face further action.

In light of the warning notice, new JPH interim chief executive David Hill has vowed to drive forward the necessary improvements.

“The challenges raised by the CQC are my top priority,” said Mr Hill. “We welcome the fact that the CQC are driving up standards of bedside care across the country including this hospital.

“The JPH fully accepts that the necessary pace of improvement here has not been fast enough and we should have responded more quickly.

“The board, under the interim chairmanship of Peter Franzen, has made it clear that a turnaround in this situation is required including significant changes at management level.”

The hospital has already taken a number of actions including better communication with, and education of, nursing and medical staff, standardised documentation to reduce duplication and the amount of paperwork, ongoing audits with instant feedback to highlight areas of good practice and to make improvements where necessary and reviewing DNAR forms to ensure decisions are clearly documented.

But he said these actions, which include completely revising and reprinting documentation and training staff to use the documents, will take some months to deliver and embed.

Andrea Gordon, the CQC’s deputy director of operations (regions), said: “We will be returning to the trust to follow up on progress and, when we do, we will expect the trust to be able to demonstrate it has made improvements.”