CQC prosecutes hospital over ‘avoidable harm’

The regulator today said it was launching the prosecution against University Hospitals Sussex Foundation Trust, with a hearing due to take place at Brighton Magistrates Court on Monday.

It said it was bringing the action under regulations 12 (1) and 22 (2) of the Health and Social Care Act 2008, which relates to a provider’s responsibility to ensure people receive safe care and treatment, and making it a criminal offence where a breach results in avoidable harm or where a person has been exposed to a significant risk of avoidable harm.

The prosecution relates to a young person who was able to abscond from an acute children’s inpatient ward at Worthing Hospital in 2022.

The CQC has brought criminal prosecutions against multiple trusts in recent years. They include several mental health trusts that were prosecuted over a failure to prevent patients from being able to harm themselves. Other acute trusts prosecuted include Nottingham University Hospitals, East Kent Hospitals University FT, the Dudley Group, and Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital. The trusts were all found guilty and fined between £700,000 and £2.5m. 

UHSFT has been under intense scrutiny over recent years and is one of the 12 trusts subject to a government-commissioned investigation into maternity service quality. An independent review also recently uncovered claims of misogyny and sexual harrassment reported by female staff members.

*Amended at 9.35am on 23 October to correct the reason for CQC prosecution as the trust exposing a patient to a “significant risk of avoidable harm”.