Working with the CQC Blackpool NHS

Report on Care Quality Commission (CQC) Inspection Public Listening Event – Tuesday 14^th January 2014 at 6.30pm, Blackpool Football Club, Seasider’s Way, Blackpool.

Let me say from the outset that more people should get off their backsides, stop criticising and get out and meet others. The CQC gave a perfect example of how to organise and conduct a public meeting.  A Meeting that had the best intentions for that well loved British Institution, the National Health Service as its objective and, from those professionals we met, plans in place to rectify problems the ostriches deny exist.  If the hands off squadrons have computer access then I suggest they look up Mid Staffs NHS or go to the library and read the oracles on Dr Harold Shipman, Bristol's children's heart surgery, Barrow and Morecambe Midwifery services and the dire straits of many old folk in wholly unsuitable Elderly Care places.

The team we addressed listened intently and asked questions to clarify the evidence provided.  It was done in a manner you should expect from clinical scrutineers; diligent, polite and very intense.  It was a pleasure to be grilled so professionally by competent and vigorous inquisitors.  The shame is that the buried head brigades would not even permit this type of enquiry into matters that effect us all. As the hall was divided into tables and manned by sets of "examiners", it was a learning process for the CQC and a superb occasion for honest reporting of the state of Blackpool NHS facilities and staff.

Although the time we had was short, because the authority had planed well just about every section had a pair of listeners and recorders so that no-one was alienated or made to feel unwanted by not being able to raise matters they/we had been briefed so to do.

As far as I can ascertain, just about every topic was covered by a diverse section of the community and I heard things from orthopaedics to after care and eventually the perennial Nursing Homes for the Mentally Impaired.   The hope is that the CQC was provided with the ammunition to address the problems of Blackpool.

For those who rang me with questions, I shall answer them in private as arranged.  For others and for the community as a whole, the Drop-In Centre shall be manned/or womanned on Tuesday Mornings 10.00 to 11.00. and Thursday afternoons from 2.00 to 3.00pm.

Find me at the R.E.S.T. Foundation shop on Bond Street, South Shore.