HOSPITALS IN GRAMPIAN region have been branded as the poorest in the country for cleanliness – but the team behind the claim say that improvements are being made.
NHS Grampian was named alongside NHS Tayside as the joint worst health boards in Scotland in terms of cleanliness by Health Facilities Scotland (HFS) in a study undertaken from April to June this year.
HFS works with the Scottish Government and NHS Scotland to establish best practice in hospitals and facilities throughout the country.
Teams from HFS inspect facilities on a regular basis measuring performance of domestic staff in cleaning such as toilets and floors. In their latest report HFS said that Grampian scored a 94.3% domestic compliance rating against a national average of 95.7%.
However, the report stressed that was an improvement by the health authority who had scored just 93.9% in the previous study.
The report was hailed as ‘good news’ by Dr Jamie Weir, chairman of patient lobby group the Patient Action Coordination Team.
Saying that issues with historic underfunding had been the cause of NHS Grampian scoring so low, Dr Weir added: “This is good news – there has been much in the news recently about the board, but any steps to improve cleanliness has to be welcomed.”
A spokeswoman for NHS Grampian said that the authority “continued to take compliance with national cleaning standards very seriously”.
She added: “As we have reported previously, NHS Grampian is not complacent around cleaning standards and we recognise the challenge of maintaining high standards in some of our older buildings.”