Infirmary patients at risk from superbugs

Date published: 14/11/2007

Isolation  facilities to battle the spread of potentially fatal superbugs at the Rochdale Infirmary are woefully inadequate.

The admission came from health boss John Saxby, who said multi-bedded wards at Pennine Acute Trust’s four hospitals would result in severe problems in the event of an outbreak.

The trust’s chief executive said North Manchester General Hospital had the biggest problems, but added: "That is not to suggest isolation facilities are anywhere near what they should be at our other hospitals."

He told yesterday’s trust board meeting: "Availability of isolation facilities on some of our wards are quite frankly inadequate, and expose us to a large risk if we were to get an outbreak."

He said the ideal for a hospital was to replace wards with single rooms, and he added: "We simply do not have adequate isolation facilities on our wards.

"They are not even one-eighth of the way to meeting that sort of standard.

"We run a real risk and if there were an outbreak we would have severe problems."

Mr Saxby, who has been at the helm of the trust since June, said it needed to seriously address the issue on how to put forward proposals to deal with the problem.

"We need to look at what we are doing with our real estate, although there are issues and pressures around affordability," he said.

John Wilkes, director of facilities, backed his view, saying: "Nationally, there is a move towards hospitals having 100 per cent single rooms."

Last month, two outbreaks of sickness and diarrhoea hit the Royal Oldham Hospital, affecting a total of 25 patients and 14 staff.

Latest MRSA figures for Pennine Acute Trust show a total of 49 cases from April to the end of October.

It has already bust its target for the whole year, of 38 cases, but the figures are around a quarter down on the number of cases last year — a significant improvement, according to executive nursing director Marian Carroll.

Of the 49, 14 patients already had the bug before going into hospital, while 35 caught it in hospital.

The number of C.diff cases are below target, with 253 from April to the end of October, compared to the 329 target.

"We are performing well, but we have to continue our sustained efforts to continue reducing them," she added.