GREAT Western Hospital has made concerted efforts to improve safety in its emergency department as a health watchdog report revealed four out of five trusts are falling down in patient safety.

The report by Professor Sir Mike Richards, the Care Quality Commission’s chief inspector of hospitals, said safety in hospitals is a “real concern” and that the model of acute hospital care is failing to meet the needs of today’s population.

The Great Western Hospital currently holds a Requires Improvement rating in the area of safety.

In 2015 concerns were raised by the CQC in regards to the safety of Marlborough Road hospital’s emergency department.

But when CQC inspectors visited in November last year they found significant improvements had been made in the safety of urgent and emergency services.

Record-keeping, oversight of staffing, capacity and safety and care for mental health patients had all notably improved.

The report says concerns remain about the reliance on temporary staff with inspectors stating there was room for improvement to ensure that patients are protected against the risk of inappropriate care and treatment.

A Great Western Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust spokesman said efforts were ongoing to continue the positive progress.

"Since our initial inspection nearly two years ago, the Care Quality Commission has returned to the Trust on a number of occasions, with each visit prompting inspectors to praise the extensive improvement work that has been carried out by our hard working teams," he said.

“Following the CQC’s last visit in October 2016, it was found that, despite significant demand, good progress had been made to improve safety in the emergency department.

“While much good work has taken place already, we continue with our improvement journey and look forward to highlighting this positive work to the CQC during its next routine inspection of our services later this month.”

The CQC introduced a new inspection programme in 2013 and has inspected all NHS acute and specialist hospital trusts under the new regime.

Overall, 81 per cent of the 136 non-specialist trusts were deemed to be inadequate or to require improvement for safety with 11 per cent of hospital trusts given the lowest rating for safety.

More than half of specialist trusts were rated as requiring improvement in terms of safety.

Sir Mike said: “We have witnessed some fantastic care and examples of innovative practice, but we have also found a wide variation in quality both between hospitals and between services within the same hospital.

“The NHS now stands on a burning platform - the need for change is clear, but finding the resources and energy to deliver that change while simultaneously providing safe patient care can seem almost impossible.”

He adds: “The scale of the challenge that hospitals are now facing is unprecedented - rising demand coupled with economic pressures are creating difficult-to-manage situations that are putting patient care at risk.”

GWH’s management was asked for a comment yesterday but no one was available.