I am pleased to introduce the Quality Account for Gateshead Health NHS Foundation Trust for 2025/26, which reflects our continued commitment to delivering safe, effective and compassionate care for the communities we serve. This year has taken place in the context of an exceptionally challenging NHS environment, with sustained high demand across urgent and emergency care, ongoing workforce pressures, and increasing financial constraints across the system. These challenges have required us to work differently, to prioritise carefully, and to maintain a relentless focus on quality and safety while operating within the resources available to us and working within our Alliance to maximise these.
Against this backdrop, I want to begin by recognising the outstanding dedication, professionalism and resilience of our staff. Across all areas of the organisation including QE Facilities, colleagues continue to go above and beyond to deliver high-quality care for patients, often under significant pressure. Their commitment, compassion and teamwork remain the strongest asset of this Trust, and I am deeply grateful for everything they have contributed this year.
Despite the challenges, we have made meaningful progress in a number of important areas. In urgent and emergency care, we have delivered a significant improvement in patient flow, reducing the proportion of patients experiencing waits over 12 hours in our Emergency Department to 2.5%, compared with 4.68% the previous year. This improvement reflects the impact of a sustained, clinically led programme of work focused on flow, discharge processes, bed utilisation and improving decision-making across the hospital. While this progress is welcome, we recognise the need to continue this work to ensure improvements are sustained and embedded.
Alongside this, we have continued to develop our approach to patient flow and system capacity more broadly. Work across the organisation to improve discharge processes, strengthen multidisciplinary working, and optimise use of hospital beds has supported better patient progression through our services. This has been particularly important in managing sustained demand pressures and ensuring that patients receive care in the most appropriate setting.
We have also made strong progress in maternity and neonatal services, which remain a particular area of excellence for the Trust. We are proud that our service has been rated first nationally in the Picker CQC maternity survey for 2024 and 2025, reflecting sustained improvement over recent years. This achievement is underpinned by strong leadership, a highly engaged multidisciplinary workforce, and a clear focus on safety, personalised care and co-production with women and families. The continued embedding of national safety programmes and investment in workforce development has further strengthened both safety and experience for families using our services.
We have also made important progress in strengthening partnerships beyond the Trust, particularly with voluntary and community sector organisations. As an anchor institution within Gateshead, we are increasingly working alongside partners to better understand and respond to the wider determinants of health. This collaboration is helping us to support more holistic, joined-up care and to improve awareness of the community-based support available to patients and families.
Digital transformation continues to be another key enabler of improvement. The expansion of digital care planning and the implementation of improved observation systems have supported safer, more consistent care and reduced administrative burden on clinical staff. These developments are helping to free up time for care, improve access to information, and support better clinical decision-making at the point of need. Although work has progressed, there is more to do in this area.
We have also continued to make progress in addressing health inequalities, including the early rollout of Making Every Contact Count in pilot areas, improvements in health literacy approaches, and the introduction of reasonable adjustment flags to support more inclusive care. While this work is still in its early stages, it is an important foundation for reducing variation in access and outcomes across our communities.
Looking ahead, we know there is more to do. We will continue to build on the progress made this year while addressing the areas where improvement is still required. Our Quality Account reflects both the progress we have made and the scale of the challenges we continue to face. I want to close by again recognising our staff, whose commitment, professionalism and compassion continue to underpin everything we achieve. Their work makes a real difference every day to patients and families across Gateshead, and I am extremely proud of what they continue to deliver in such challenging circumstances.
Dr Sean Fenwick, Chief Executive