Trusts admit ‘severe’ harm to children

Children have suffered severe harm at two further hospital trusts as a result of failures in paediatric audiology, HSJ has revealed.

HSJ reported in July that three children at Croydon Health Service Trust may have come to “severe harm” – meaning they may have suffered permanent damage – following failures in the trust’s processes in audiology.

Now East and North Hertfordshire Trust and North West Anglia Foundation Trust have also confirmed a small number of cases of severe or serious harm; while some trusts have yet to confirm findings from case reviews they have carried out.

Major problems emerged earlier this year, initially in Scotland, of poor quality checks missing children with hearing problems who should have received support, and of a failure to inspect the services.

NHS England ordered a review of data from the national newborn screening programme which, alongside other review work, identified six English trusts as having likely failures in their service: Croydon, East and North Herts, North West Anglia, Warrington and Halton Hospitals, North Lincolnshire and Goole, and Worcestershire Acute Hospitals.

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Source: HSJ, 14 September 2023