More than three million NHS patients are still being admitted to mixed-sex wards each year despite repeated promises by ministers to end this.

Mixed-sex NHS wards for 3m patients

Extracts from the Telegraph:

"A study published by the Healthcare Commission has also found that hospitals were getting dirtier, fewer staff were always washing their hands before touching patients and a fifth of people who needed help with meals were still not getting it.

Its survey of 76,000 inpatients in England – the largest of its kind – measured hospitals on factors that included quality of care, dignity and respect, privacy, waiting times, complaints and quality and availability of information."

"Last year, almost 13 million people stayed at least one night in hospitals in England, meaning that up to 3.2 million were admitted to a mixed-sex ward.

Nearly a third of patients also reported having to use a bathroom shared with members of the opposite sex.

Medway NHS Trust in Kent was the worst in the country for mixed-sex wards, with a score of 54.83. The Cardio­thoracic Centre in Liverpool rated highest on 97.45.

Labour first promised to abolish mixed-sex wards in 2002 but after arguments over what constituted a ward or a sleeping area, Lord Darzi, the health minister and a practising surgeon, said single-sex wards were "an aspiration that cannot be met". "

Scores of NHS hospitals across England are failing to protect patients' dignity and to meet basic standards of cleanliness and care, Commission warns.

Hospitals let down by the basics in patient survey - Guardian

There's a lot more detail in the full article.

Extract:

"Scores of NHS hospitals across England are failing to protect patients' dignity and to meet basic standards of cleanliness and care, the government's health watchdog warned today in its annual check of conditions on the wards.

The Healthcare Commission found 30% of inpatients have to share bathrooms or shower areas with the opposite sex, in spite of government guidance that the practice is upsetting, particularly to women.

It identified a handful of trusts where most patients have to wash in mixed-sex facilities, which rarely exist in public buildings outside the health service and which ministers claimed to have eradicated. At St Mary's teaching hospital in central London, 59% of patients shared mixed-sex bathrooms.

The commission's huge survey of 80,000 inpatients' experiences also found that 20% of people who could not eat without assistance said they did get enough help. This rose to 42% at Queen Mary's hospital in Sidcup.

The report found 30 trusts where at least 20% of patients said the quality of meals was poor, rising to 32% at Queen Mary's Sidcup and at North Middlesex hospital in Edmonton, north London.

Across England, 15% of inpatients said it took staff more than five minutes to respond to an emergency call button, rising to 39% at Queen Mary's Sidcup."


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