Barts Health NHS Trust

The trust was established on 1 April 2012 following the dissolution and merger of three existing NHS trusts:[3]

• Barts and The London NHS Trust and Newham University Hospital NHS Trust, both established on 21 February 1994 to provide services previously provided by the East London and The City Health Authority[4][5]
• Whipps Cross University Hospital NHS Trust, established on 5 June 2000 to provide services previously provided by the Redbridge and Waltham Forest Health Authority[6]

The trust runs five hospitals:

• Mile End Hospital in Mile End
• Newham University Hospital in Plaistow
• Royal London Hospital in Whitechapel
• St Bartholomew's Hospital in the West Smithfield
• Whipps Cross University Hospital in Leytonstone

It also used to run the London Chest Hospital in Bethnal Green, which closed in 2015. The trust has also taken on formal legal responsibility for the operation of the NHS Nightingale Hospital London, a temporary hospital set up at ExCeL London to treat patients during the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic.[7]

On 11 January 2021, the Trust opened the NHS Covid-19 Vaccination Centre, Newham at the ExCeL London site.[8]

The trust serves a population of over 2.6 million people, in an area characterised by significant diversity and health inequalities. It is one of the largest NHS trusts in England, and accounts for 1.5% of all hospital activity in England. It provides district general hospital services to the London Boroughs of Tower Hamlets, Waltham Forest and Newham, and also provides some specialist services to a wider area, including some on a national basis. It runs the largest cardiovascular centre in the United Kingdom, the second largest cancer centre in London, and leading stroke and renal units.[9]

In addition to its five hospitals, the trust also runs a number of other facilities, including two birthing centres and some dental and primary care services.[10]

During the COVID-19 pandemic in England the numbers of staff cycling to work increased dramatically and the Trust doubled its cycle parking spaces to 260 using two tier racks.[11]

In January 2014 a Care Quality Commission inspection found that morale in the trust was low and that "Too many members of staff of all levels and across all sites came to us to express their concerns about being bullied, and many only agreed to speak to us in confidence."[12]

In September 2014 the local City and Hackney Clinical Commissioning Group complained that they had "significant evidence of failing administrative and support systems, which is reflected strongly and consistently in feedback received from local GPs”. There were concerns about waiting times performance, and levels of clinical harm.[13]

The trust was one of 26 responsible for half of the national growth in patients waiting more than four hours in accident and emergency over the 2014/5 winter.[14]

In June 2015 more than 80 doctors signed a letter highlighting “unsafe” bed occupancy rates, cuts impacting on staffing levels and overuse of agency nurses at the trust, and demanding that the private finance initiative contract should be bailed out.[15] The trust reported 1,200 vacancies – one-fifth of the nursing workforce in July 2015.[16]

The trust spent £83.6 million on agency staff in 2014/5.[17]

In March 2016 the Trust was rated as having a poor reporting culture in the Learning from Mistakes League.[18]

The trust was rated among the three worst nationally over care for women giving birth but disputes the rating.[19]

In January 2019 an MRI scanner at Whipps Cross failed, leading to 220 patients needing to be rebooked and 172 MRI breaches. The trust board papers showed that NHS England's capital funding constraints prevented "adequate investment in medical equipment to support safe, effective and timely care". It has applied for a £14 million loan covering essential expenditure.[20]

The trust has the largest private finance initiative (PFI) scheme within the NHS in England, with a capital value of £1.149 million, and spends £116 million on its annual repayments, amounting to around 8% of its annual income.[21][22]

It is one of the biggest providers of specialised services in England, which generated an income of £316.1 million in 2014/5.[23]

The trust spent £83.6 million on agency staff in 2014/5.[17]

The trust spent £935,500 on a “turnaround” management consultant, Donald Muir, a director of Titanium Global Solutions who worked at the Trust from October 2013 to July 2014.[24] The Trust spent more than £7m on five consultancy firms in the 14 months to December 2014:

• Burnett Re-Engineering, £312,056;
• Cairdeas Consulting, £202,030;
• JAT HR, £252,875;
• PwC, £4,857,833;
• Titanium Global Solutions, £1,376,937[25]

The chief executive, Peter Morris, and chief nurse, Kay Riley, resigned their positions in February 2015, shortly after it was revealed that the trust reported a £93m deficit.[26] At the time, Mr Morris was the highest paid NHS Trust CEO in the country; receiving a salary of £275,000 per annum.[27] In March 2015 the trust was placed into special measures following a CQC report into Whipps Cross Hospital.[28] In May 2015 the CQC said it was seriously understaffed, focussed too little on safety and had cancelled operations on numerous occasions because there were too few beds, rating it inadequate.[29]

The trust issued invoices to patients thought to be ineligible for NHS treatment totalling £10.1 million in 2018–9, but only collected £1.1 million.[30] In 2019-20 it charged 144 women who used the maternity services (out of 14,270 babies delivered that year) but had to cancel 35 of them, presumably because they were actually found to be entitled to NHS services free-at-the-point-of-use.[31]

• Healthcare in London
• List of NHS trusts

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Barts Health NHS Trust.

• Official website
• NHS Covid-19 Vaccination Centre, Newham website
• Barts Health NHS Trust on the NHS website
• Inspection reports from the Care Quality Commission