§ Lord Marlesfordasked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether they will publish in the Official Report the names of hospitals in England which failed their hygiene test; and when they expect the re-testing of these hospitals to be completed. [HL1525]
§ Lord Hunt of Kings HeathThe Clean Hospitals programme was launched last year in the NHS Plan. National Health Service trusts produced a detailed assessment of the patient environment. Patient environment action teams (PEATs) visited over 400 hospitals in the autumn of last year to make an independent assessment of the quality of the patient environment. Standards of cleanliness were one element of the assessment. Therefore, it was not just a hygiene test.
Hospitals were judged across a comprehensive list of patient environment criteria and were categorised as excellent, acceptable or poor. The initial visits did identify that some hospitals needed to make improvements in the levels of cleanliness.
The PEAT teams have recently completed unannounced visits to all of the hospitals they visited in the autumn and assessed what progress had been made against the action plan. NHS Estates is currently collating and analysing the results. We will publish the results when the report has been finalised.
We can confirm that the results show that significant, tangible improvements have been made.