Published on: 29 March 2018
Staff at City Hospitals Sunderland NHS Foundation Trust are some of the most satisfied in the NHS according to the results of the NHS Staff Survey for 2017.
The Trust scored above the national average on many indicators including the number of staff recommending the Trust as a place to work or to receive care or treatment.77% of staff agreed that the ‘care of patients is the Trust’s top priority’ and 90% felt that their role makes a difference to patients.
The Trust achieved one of the best scores in the country among acute trusts for staff feeling ‘confident and secure in reporting unsafe clinical practice’ with 97% of staff knowing how to report any concerns and 92% of staff feeling encouraged by the Trust to report errors, near misses, or incidents.
In total, City Hospitals Sunderland scored higher than the national average in 18 of the 32 key quality indicators and was in the top 20% of Trusts in England on 11 key quality indicators including:
- high staff satisfaction with the quality of work and care they are able to deliver
- high staff satisfaction with their level of responsibility and involvement
- high staff satisfaction with the resourcing and support available to them
Despite such a strong performance and positive feedback from staff, Trust leaders are now focussed on continuing to improve quality even further and will be looking in detail at the results.Some of the core areas for improvement based on the 2017 NHS Staff Survey will involve looking at how the Trust can improve staff appraisal rates and reduce the number of staff experiencing physical violence at work.
Over 1,900 Sunderland staff expressed their views as part of the national NHS Staff Survey, a seven per cent increase on last year’s response rate.
Commenting on the results, Director of Human Resources and Organisational Development, Kath Griffin said:“I would like to thank all staff who took the time to respond to this important survey.It is really pleasing to see our response rate increase as this means we are now getting a much fuller picture of staff views and opinions from right across our organisation.
“This year has been immensely challenging for all of our staff and we have experienced the busiest winter on record for our services.Despite this relentless pressure it is very encouraging to receive such positive feedback from our teams.We know, however, that there will always be more we can do to improve staff experience.”
Ken Bremner, chief executive of City Hospitals Sunderland and South Tyneside NHS Foundation Trusts said:“Given the relentless pressures over the past year we are encouraged by the latest staff survey results and feel very proud of our staff and the efforts they make every single day to provide high quality patient care.
“We will now be looking closely at the feedback to understand where we can improve staff engagement and experience even further so that every single member of our workforce feels empowered to make positive changes as we continue to evolve and embed a supportive learning culture right across the South Tyneside and Sunderland Healthcare Group.”
The NHS Staff Survey, which seeks the views of staff working across England, is the largest survey of staff opinion in the UK. It is recognised as an important way of ensuring that the views of staff working in the NHS inform local improvements and that staff have their say in the delivery of high quality, safe and effective care.
