A HEALTH watchdog’s report released today states that hospitals in Gloucestershire “require improvement”.

The Care Quality Commission inspected Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust in March this year.

Though nearly two thirds of the service is rated either ‘good’ or ‘outstanding’ in today's report, more than one third is rated ‘requiring improvement’ – the latter being the trust’s overall rating.

The CQC inspected 78 individual domains or services in Gloucestershire Royal Hospital, Cheltenham General Hospital and Stroud Maternity Unit.

Fifty one are rated ‘good’ or ‘outstanding’ making Gloucestershire the only county in the South West region to receive the CQC’s highest rating.

Twenty seven, however, are judged as ‘requiring improvement’, leaving the trust with an overall rating of ‘requires improvement’. No results of ‘inadequate’ were given to any of the services run by the trust.

Services highlighted as ‘requiring improvement’ across both of the trust’s hospitals include urgent and emergency services, medical care and end of life care.

The leadership of the trust are deemed 'good' while the critical care offered at the two hospitals received a rating of 'outstanding'. Surgery, maternity and gynaecology services are judged to be ‘good’ in both Gloucester and Cheltenham.

Children and young people’s services at Gloucester also received a ‘good’ rating, as well as maternity services at Stroud.

Chief executive of the trust Dr Frank Harsent said: “There were a number of areas highlighted as either ‘good’ or ‘outstanding’ within the report, and also areas of best practice and innovation, such as the care provided by the critical care team at Gloucester and Cheltenham.

“The report also highlighted a number of areas for improvement, which we have already begun to address, and we know that we can always learn and improve our services further.

“Clearly the winter was a very challenging period for us and this has had an impact on our performance. In relation to the four hour waiting standard at A and E, while this is a wider issue than just our hospitals, we are determined to make this better for patients and we are working closely with our health and care partners to do this.”

The trust is now developing a detailed action plan in response to the areas identified for improvement.

The CQC are an independent regulator of health and adult social care whose job is to make sure health and social care services provide people with safe, effective, compassionate, high-quality care.

The CQC monitors, inspects and regulates services across England to ensure they meet fundamental standards of quality and safety.

Find the full report at www.cqc.org.uk.