Worthing and Southlands hospitals celebrate 10 years as a trust: 'this is the best place to work in the world'

Western Sussex Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust celebrated the 10th anniversary of it being founded last Monday.

At Worthing Hospital, in Lyndhurst Road, Worthing, hundreds of staff members and volunteers gathered outside the reception to celebrate the milestone – and to have a slice of the giant birthday cake made by Truffles Bakery, which is apparently one of the biggest they have ever made.

Similar celebrations were held at Southlands, in Upper Shoreham Road, Shoreham, and St Richard’s, in Spitalfield Lane, Chichester, which are the other hospitals which make up the trust.

Among those cutting the cake in Worthing were Dr George Findlay, executive medical director and deputy chief executive of the trust, and nursing director Dr Maggie Davies. Dr Findlay has been at the trust for five years, having previously been working in Cardiff.

He said: “We are only the fifth trust to be rated ‘Outstanding’ by the Care Quality Commission in England, so it is testament to all the hard work that our staff put in.

“It is phenomenally busy, but we give a great quality of care to our patients.

“We have a privileged job and our job is to make sure patients can access really high-quality care, and we think in Worthing and Chichester and Southlands we have helped that to happen.

“But that is down to our staff: through the hard work of our staff we deliver care that is really appreciated. They feel valued, they feel safe and well looked after when they come to hospital.”

How the trust has changed, from 2009 to 2019

Outpatients: Appointment numbers up almost 40% to 605,000

Inpatients and day cases: Up by nearly a quarter to 138,000

Scans and x-rays: Up by a third to around 400,000

Average length of stay: More than halved – down from 5 days to less than 2.5

Hospital-acquired MRSA consigned to history: 0 cases at present

C.diff almost eradicated: 252 cases a year to less than 30

New investment: £150million into buildings, equipment, clinical facilities and IT

A further £20 million in donations from Love Your Hospital and our Friends’ organisations

More staff/volunteers: Trust family has grown by a fifth to nearly 10,000 staff and volunteers

Staff turnover: down from 13% to 8%

Vacancy rate: down from 14% to 11%

Sickness rate: down from 6% to 4%

"This is the best trust to work for in the world"

Dr Davies joined the trust more than four years ago after working for the Brighton & Hove Clinical Commissioning Group.

She said: “This is the best trust to work for in the world. Worthing is my local hospital, so it means a lot to me. I couldn’t be prouder to work for this trust.”

The trust was formed on April 1, 2009, when the Royal West Sussex and Worthing & Southlands NHS trusts merged.

Within four years, Western Sussex Hospitals was granted foundation trust status, which gives greater control over decision making.

In April 2016, it became the first multi-site hospital trust to be rated ‘Outstanding’ by the Care Quality Commission.

Chief executive Dame Marianne Griffiths spearheaded the trust’s success. She said: “I am extraordinarily proud of Western Sussex Hospitals and everyone who works and volunteers for the trust.

“Their exemplary care, kindness and compassion are experienced by thousands of people every day and their achievements over the past ten years have been absolutely phenomenal.”

The trust has seen demand for its services rise dramatically since 2009, a spokesman said. This year, 605,000 outpatient appointments took place – up nearly 40 per cent in 10 years.

Similarly, the number of inpatients and day cases staff see each year has risen by 23 per cent to 138,000 in 2018/19, while 143,000 people attended the trust’s accident and emergency departments – 400 a day on average.