I spent many years working in York, am a resident of the city and chief exec of near by Hull and East Yorkshire Mind.
I was devastated to hear the news that Bootham Park Hospital was being closed on the orders of the CQC. We have known for some time about their concerns and it is shocking that the different parts of the NHS, the provider, the commissioner, the property owner and the regulator, have been unable to work together to resolve this. Blaming each other won’t find solutions and we now need to see clear leadership to find a speedy way forward.
Imagine if this had been the maternity ward, A&E or a cancer ward for the whole city that had been closed. There would be a national outcry. Sadly we see mental health services yet again relegated to the shadows with no answers, no accountability and no certainty over what happens next.
This closure will have a tremendous impact on local people. Not only those inpatients being forced to move to other parts of the country but those currently using the hospital for out patient appointments and therapy. The loss of our s136 suite (place of safety for those detained by the police) only opened in 2013 with a significant investment from the CCG leaves York back amongst the handful of places still to detain people, without criminal convictions, in a police cell when they become unwell.
That requirement within the NHS Mandate for Parity of Esteem between physical and mental healthcare seems a very long way away today.
Update: statement from VoYCCG http://www.valeofyorkccg.nhs.uk/current-work/bootham-park-hospital
Update: statement from LYPFT http://www.leedspft.nhs.uk/news/latest_news/1/850
Update: statement from CQC http://www.cqc.org.uk/content/statement-bootham-park-hospital
David Smith 
6 replies on “Shock closure of Yorks Bootham Park Hospital by CQC”
As usual David Smith you’ve hit the nail on the head! Mental health always comes a poor second to physical health! They would be marching on the streets if YDH was closed down in this arbitrary manner! It’s a travesty and one which I hope they will rethink and work together to resolve this problem! SURELY they can do that much!
Sadly we can’t even read the full CQC report yet, and as of this afternoon, they can’t even say when it will be published.
Without the full facts to explain why such drastic action has been taken its going to be hard for anybody, outside of the inner circle, to understand why it happened or what can be done to help resolve it.
Frustrating!
You can’t understand why the CQC took such “drastic action”? It’s fairly obvious.
Bootham has been known to be unsuitable as a modern mental health hospital for well over ten years now. Nothing was done.
It was inspected by CQC in February 2014 (report on CQC site) and rated as inadequate for “safety and suitability of premises” due to lack of maintenance and a proliferation of ligature points. The CQC “discussed our immediate concerns with the provider who agreed to carry out an immediate environmental risk assessment and would implement actions to make the environment safe.”
Nothing was done
It was inspected again by the CQC in October 2014 (report on CQC site) and again rated as inadequate for safety due to ligature points and lack of maintenance.
Nothing was done.
It was inspected again by the CQC in September this year. Nothing had been done. Ligature points still abound (impossible to get rid of all of them in a Grade 1 listed 18th Century building) and the maintenance was so bad that the ceiling fell down on top of one of the inspectors. They closed down the hospital.
Suddenly LYPFT and the CCG start bleating about how the hospital is being closed by those nasty CQC inspectors at short notice. They had a year and a half and still did nowt. In the intervening time, two patients hung themselves in the hospital. How long do you let things drag on for? CQC have an obligation to protect patients. Better to be cared for in a safe hospital 100 miles away than a dangerous hospital on your doorstep.
Everything you say I agree with. We’ve known for a long time how poor the building structure has become and how poor the maintenance has been.
None of these things are surprises though, they were there the last time the CQC visited yet then the hospital was left open.
The ceiling falling down sounds dramatic but it unlikely to be the entire ceiling affecting every area.
I suspect this time they found more. Something else maybe not related to the structure. Without the full report though we just don’t know and are left guessing.
Reblogged this on Phoenix Community Interest Group and commented:
Saddened to learn of this.
What the rest of us want to know is
1. Why were LYPFT figure fudging complaints by refusing to record them after the damning evidence of a poor complaints process in the CQC report?
I spoke to the CQC because Mr Butler refuses to register any more of my complaints. If that’s not figure fudging what is?
2. Several service users have raised serious safeguarding failures yet the CQC have never addressed this issue and leave the safeguarding issue as being adequate, when it’s is far from that!
3. One CQC report identified unsafe CMHT case loads with each care co-ordinaries having excessive unsafe case loads of 40-50 yet safe case loads are 30. This situation has not changed yet that should shut the entire mental health service if Boorhsm closure was based on that.
4. If the closure was based on 2 hangings at Bootham why were Leeds not prevented from operating when a vulnerable Leeds man in crisis was left alone with a noose by the Crisis Team in 2013 and subsequently completed suicide?
Are we going to look at ligature points in every hospital? Are we going to remove every door, the easiest ligature point. Something is not right with this sudden closure !