Patients didn't feel safe and were laughed at by staff at Fareham hospital, inspectors find
A hospital in Hampshire has dropped from a good to inadequate rating after inspectors found patients "didn't feel safe" and some staff "laughed at them".
Uplands Independent Hospital in Fareham was visited by inspectors from the Care Quality Commission in January.
Karen Bennett-Wilson, the CQC's Head of Hospital Inspection said: "We found that patients didn't feel safe at the hospital, and that some staff didn't treat them with kindness, didn't respect their dignity or their privacy; and sometimes laughed at them."
The hospital provides rehabilitation mental health services for up to 30 adults. At the time of the inspection there were 19 inpatients.
Watch: Karen Bennett-Wilson says wards were not clean and patients felt unsafe
Ms Bennett-Wilson added: "We found that the wards weren't clean, there wasn't enough skilled staff to care for patients.
"They didn't follow an appropriate recovery model which you would expect in line with the national best practice. They didn't offer activities to support people to move on with their lives."
The overall rating for the service dropped from good to inadequate overall. The ratings for being effective, caring, responsive and well-led also dropped from good to inadequate. Safety dropped from requires improvement to inadequate.
Inspectors say the culture in the hospital was "more like a care home" where people stay on a long-term basis. It found people were staying in the hospital for an average of five years, and some had been there for as long as 22 years.
It was originally established to provide life-long care for people with mental health issues but national guidance has since changed, and the hospital should now be focused on supporting people to learn to live independently in the community, according to the CQC.
Coveberry Limited, which operates Uplands, says that progress has been made since the inspection.
A spokesperson for Uplands said: "We acknowledge the findings of the published CQC report following a visit in January 2022. A robust action plan has been put in place, and is already making a tangible difference.
"A new hospital director and additional consultant psychiatrist support continue to make sustainable improvements, and we are confident that significant progress has been made since the time of the inspection.
"The safety and wellbeing of the people in the service is our highest priority and we will continue to work closely with CQC, Commissioners and other stakeholders to ensure that the level of care provided at Uplands meets the highest standards."