Monday 28 April 2014

The 'Spin' - Ashford and St. Peter's PR machine at work.


Now, a few days ago I Blogged an article from The Daily Telegraph which warned how hospitals appeared to be ‘gaming’ the codes – fixing the coding of deaths in hospitals to make them look as though deaths were due to unavoidable causes like cancer rather than poor treatment.

Dr Foster has been warning about this for some time.

The Telgeraph article showed that Ashford and St. Peter’s has had a dramatic increase in ‘Palliative’ deaths, which reduces the other kind of deaths which make the statistics look bad.

In fact, the Trust had the 9th highest increase in so-called ‘Palliative’ deaths in the country.

You can check out my article here;


Meanwhile this was the Trust’s take on the Dr Foster figures back in December 2013. Things looked so rosy then, didn’t they? This is their own press release;

New hospital report highlights low mortality rates 

 

 Written by Communications Team     

 

The Dr Foster Good Hospital Guide 2013, published this weekend, once again confirms low mortality rates at Ashford and St Peter’s Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. And this year the Trust has been named by Dr Foster as being one of the top performing hospitals for having low mortality rates including at the weekends.

 

Medical Director Dr David Fluck explains more: “Once again, this year’s hospital guide confirms low mortality rates for Ashford and St Peter’s, which is good news for our patients. Mortality rates for hospitals are quite complicated and are measured in several different ways; local people should be reassured by the fact that we have lower than expected rates for each separate measure indicating a good overall picture. But perhaps most reassuring is that we have very low mortality rates for both weekdays and weekends, reflecting the high standards of care and good staffing levels that we provide seven days a week.

(extracts)

 

Last Updated on Thursday, 12 December 2013 16:34 

Now compare it to what Dr Foster actually says.

Not quite the same is it?

Neil Harris

(a don’t stop till you drop production)

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