Named among UK’s best hospitals for inpatient care

Royal Papworth Hospital has been named as one of the top NHS Trusts in the country for inpatient care, according to the Care Quality Commission Adult Inpatient Survey 2023.

The annual survey looks at the experiences of people who stayed at least one night in hospital. It asked patients for their views on all aspects of their care, such as: the hospital environment; communication with staff; involvement in decisions; and being treated with dignity and respect. 

Royal Papworth was one of nine hospitals to have achieved the highest band of ‘much better than expected’, which is based on the proportion of patients who responded positively compared to the average. 

It is the fifth year-in-a-row that the hospital has been named in the top category. 

On average, patients rated the overall experience as 9.2 out of 10. 

The Trust scored particularly highly for privacy (9.9), cleanliness (9.7), getting enough to drink (9.8), having confidence in the doctors (9.8) and nurses (9.5), being treated with respect and dignity (9.7), being treated with kindness and compassion (9.8) and being given enough information about their condition or treatment (9.5).

A nurse attends to a patient on a ward at Royal Papworth Hospital

Maura Screaton, Chief Nurse at Royal Papworth Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, said: “We are delighted to see more excellent results in the CQC Adult Inpatient Survey.

“Maintaining these high levels and ranking is testament to the outstanding care our staff provide as teams each day, working tirelessly and constantly showcasing our values of excellence, compassion and collaboration to provide the very best patient experience.”

“I am very proud of their work and dedication and know our teams will be proud of these results too.”

Eilish Midlane, Chief Executive at Royal Papworth Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, added: “Thank you to every patient who took time to complete the CQC Adult Inpatient Survey. Their feedback is gratefully received and essential in helping us to highlight areas that we are doing well in, as well as identifying other areas that require more focus.

“Ultimately all feedback submitted by patients, visitors and staff throughout the year is incredibly useful as it allows us to continuously improve our services for the benefit of our patients.”

The report summarises the experiences of more than 63,000 patients who used NHS adult inpatient services during November 2023. 

At Royal Papworth 789 patients completed the survey, a 65% response rate. This is a much higher response rate than the national average of 41.7%. 

Trusts were then listed in one of seven categories based on the proportion of patients who responded positively compared to the average; ‘much better than expected’, ‘better than expected’, ‘somewhat better than expected’, ‘about the same’, ‘somewhat worse than expected’, ‘worse than expected’ or ‘much worse than expected’.

Further details on Royal Papworth’s report can be found on the CQC website.