Shropshire's major hospitals 'continued to have Covid-19 outbreaks' into January
The trust running Shropshire's major hospitals continued to have a number of Covid-19 outbreaks in December and January, according to a new report.
As of January 18, some 99 patients and 40 staff were involved in 'open outbreaks' at The Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust (SaTH), which runs Royal Shrewsbury Hospital and Princess Royal Hospital in Telford.
An infection prevention and control report to the trust's board of directors says the majority of these were at PRH.
The report said: " Two of these, one on the positive and high risk respiratory ward (Ward 17) and one on the paediatric ward (Ward 19) involved staff only, with the latter outbreak linked to a lack of social distancing in the staff room which has been resolved by allocation of a much larger space."
In response, it says a number of checks had taken place in areas such as cleaning and PPE, while other measures have included putting up further plastic protective curtains in A&E.
There were also 18 Covid-19 outbreaks, across both hospital sites, in October and November which have now been 'closed'.
Improvements
Six involved staff only, in estates, research team, maternity sonographers, porters, emergency and Ward 32 – a high risk Covid-19 respiratory ward.
The largest outbreaks were on Ward 26 and Ward 25.
The report says a visit was also made to Ward 26 by the lead infection prevention and control nurse for the clinical commissioning group on December 18.
It found some areas of good practice were being followed, but the trust was also asked to make improvements in areas such as reminding patients to wear face masks, removing chairs from the staff room and ensuring wipes are readily available for cleaning all observation equipment between patients.
"All improvement actions have been completed or commenced," the report said.
The report says the criteria for a Covid outbreak is defined as “two or more test-confirmed or clinically suspected cases of Covid-19 among individuals associated with a specific setting, where at least one case (if a patient) has been identified as having illness onset after eight days of admission to hospital".
The trust's board will meet online tomorrow to discuss the report.
