Mrs L made a number of complaints about the coordination of her discharge from hospital in 2013. Initially the Trust missed the point of Mrs L's complaint and when she complained about the time taken to respond, it did not answer her concerns.
What happened
Mrs L was admitted to an intermediate care unit after she fell ill at home. When staff made plans to discharge her, her GP intervened because of concerns about lack of heating, food and carers at home. When Mrs L complained, the Trust considered Mrs L's eventual discharge rather than the original plan to discharge her. When she complained about the length of time taken to respond to her complaint, the Trust did not address her concerns.
What we found
Staff carried out appropriate assessments before the original failed discharge. When staff became aware that Mrs L's home did not have heating or hot water, they properly delayed discharging Mrs L. However, there was no evidence of an initial comprehensive nursing assessment that should have documented the information about Mrs L's home circumstances.
The Trust's complaint handling could have been better.
Putting it right
The Trust wrote to Mrs L to apologise for the poor complaint handling. It explained the action it would take to learn from these events.
East Sussex Healthcare NHS Trust
East Sussex
Did not apologise properly or do enough to put things right
Apology