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Mid Staffordshire Hospital Report: Poor management cost lives, says hospital guide

"All of these errors contributed to the situation in which poor care was allowed to continue and almost certainly cost many patients their lives"

The high number of unnecessary deaths at the disgraced National Health Service Trust could have been prevented if management at the hospitals had paid more attention to mortality rates.

According to the Dr Foster hospital guide, a hospital information service, bad management meant not enough effort and resources were invested into the death rates at Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust.

The Healthcare Commission, a former health watchdog, found that up to 1,200 extra deaths may have occurred at the Staffford and Cannock Chase hospitals in a report published in 2009.

Roger Taylor, co-founder and director of research of Dr Foster hospital guide, said that it is "highly likely" the death rate could have been cut.

He said: "Had the trust paid more attention to mortality rates, it is highly likely that deaths could have been prevented.

"The initial investigation by the Healthcare Commission, the regulator at the time, revealed that the trust's own arrangements for analysing preventable mortality had been inadequate and had failed to correctly identify patients whose care could have been improved.

"This was due to three main reasons: wholly attributing mortality rates to incorrect coding, use of flawed analyses, including comparisons of raw mortality rates, and a certain distrust of the methodology used.

"All of these errors contributed to the situation in which poor care was allowed to continue and almost certainly cost many patients their lives."

The Dr Foster hospital guide, which had named Stafford Hospital as the ninth best in England for patient safety in their November 2009 publication, said the trust had pumped resources and effort into questioning the methodology, investigating data quality and changing the way the trust recorded deaths instead of inquiring into the causes of the high figures.

He continued: "It is absolutely appropriate to question methodologies and to ensure that statistics are well founded.

"However, to pursue this single avenue whilst failing to adequately inquire into the quality of care demonstrates an organisation which lacked the management skills to run a hospital.

"In this case, a focus on targets and external liability led to an incorrect conclusion with tragic consequences."

Mr Taylor also expressed concern that similar problems could be occurring elsewhere.

"While there may not be hospitals failing on the scale of Mid Staffordshire, it is absolutely possible that similar problems are occurring elsewhere.

"The last Dr Foster Hospital Guide raised concerns over 12 hospitals with worryingly high mortality so we must remain vigilant about other instances of poor care."

Dr Jenny Lewis, lead research analyst at Dr Foster, said: "Large variations in mortality and other measures of quality of care still persist.

"Poorly performing trusts who do not investigate in the light of these measures could well be failing to provide their patients with high quality, safe clinical care."