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Staff at a hospital trust where police are investigating at least 90 deaths say they face reprisals and ridicule from bosses if they raise concerns, according to a damning report.<\/p>\n
Asked to review University Hospitals Sussex, the report\u2019s authors said they \u201crepeatedly heard concerning examples of staff, often at a senior level, being ignored, dismissed and sometimes ridiculed when speaking up\u201d.<\/p>\n
The report by Niche Health and Social Care Consulting said this fear of reprisals from whistleblowing could be harming patient safety. It also highlighted complaints of misogyny and failures to deal with \u201cunwanted romantic advances\u201d.<\/p>\n
The review team noted a number of challenges facing the trust, including an investigation by Sussex police into possible corporate and individual manslaughter charges over allegations of medical negligence and cover-up in the general surgery and neurosurgery departments. Operation Bramber is focused on the deaths of more than 90 patients, and serious harm suffered by more than 100 others. It was sparked by the concerns of two consultant whistleblowers who lost their jobs at the trust after speaking up, first revealed in the Guardian in June 2023.<\/p>\n
The report found staff feared their careers could be hindered if they raised concerns. One said they had been told not to share data that made the trust look bad. Another said when they did raise concerns they were \u201cgaslit\u201d and targeted by management.<\/p>\n
The report identified \u201csignificant issues with psychological safety at every [staff] level\u201d and noted that the fear of speaking up had worsened in the last year. It said staff identified as having the potential to disagree with management said they were deliberately ignored in meetings.<\/p>\n
A staff survey conducted for the review received 376 responses, of which more than 300 were negative or very negative on the issue of speaking up. The responses often cited a \u201cfear of reprisals\u201d.<\/p>\n
One said: \u201cThere could be comeback which will affect your career in [a] negative manner.\u201d Another said: \u201cI raised concerns. It put a target on my back. Management lied, gaslit me, would circumvent the issue, would dismiss my concerns.\u201d A third said: \u201cI feel no one listens.\u201d<\/p>\n
Quick Guide<\/span><\/p>\n <\/span>Show<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n The best public interest journalism relies on first-hand accounts from people in the know.<\/p>\n If you have something to share on this subject you can contact us confidentially using the following methods.<\/p>\n Secure Messaging in the Guardian app<\/strong><\/p>\n The Guardian app has a tool to send tips about stories. Messages are end to end encrypted and concealed within the routine activity that every Guardian mobile app performs. This prevents an observer from knowing that you are communicating with us at all, let alone what is being said.<\/p>\n If you don’t already have the Guardian app, download it (iOS\/Android) and go to the menu. Select \u2018Secure Messaging\u2019. <\/p>\n SecureDrop, instant messengers, email, telephone and post<\/strong><\/p>\n See our guide at theguardian.com\/tips\u00a0for alternative methods and the pros and cons of each.\u00a0<\/p>\n Illustration: Guardian Design \/ Rich Cousins<\/p>\n Thank you for your feedback.<\/p>\n Staff complained that the executive team discouraged bad news and different opinions. The review identified a \u201cpredominance of direct and authoritative leadership styles\u201d. It added: \u201cWe heard repeatedly that \u2018there is a parent-child dynamic in this organisation\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n It also found that \u201cincivility and poor behaviours appear to be pervasive\u201d and there was a strong view that these were tolerated by leaders. The report did not give details of these behaviours. Last year the Guardian revealed that a consultant surgeon was promoted after allegedly assaulting resident doctors during surgery.<\/p>\n Six senior women at the trust complained to the reviewers of misogyny, which was felt to be prevalent among consultants. Female staff said they faced eye rolling and other signs of dismissiveness from male colleagues when they spoke at meetings. They also faced pejorative references to sexuality when they took the lead.<\/p>\n One woman claimed she \u201cexperienced unwanted romantic advances and inappropriate comments, with no actions taken months after reporting this to various senior leaders\u201d.<\/p>\n Earlier this month the trust chief executive, George Findlay, announced his departure.<\/p>\n Andy Heeps, the acting chief executive, said the trust accepted all the report\u2019s recommendations for improvement and its \u201cvaluable insight into what we do well, where we are improving, and where there is clearly more to do\u201d.<\/p>\n He said: \u201cThe authors recognise the scale of the task in completing such a huge trust merger during the Covid pandemic, and highlight a number of key improvements such as our big reductions in waiting lists and key service quality improvements.<\/p>\n \u201cBut they also draw attention to some fundamental issues which we\u2019ve not yet succeeded in tackling \u2013 and all of these things need to change, and change quickly.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Staff at a hospital trust where police are investigating at least 90 deaths say they face reprisals and ridicule from bosses if they raise concerns, according to a damning report. Asked to review University Hospitals Sussex, the report\u2019s authors said they \u201crepeatedly heard concerning examples of staff, often at a senior level, being ignored, dismissed<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13351,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[55],"tags":[1518,578,1037,1229,1551,293,3094,2161,1876],"class_list":{"0":"post-13350","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-social-issues","8":"tag-fear","9":"tag-hospital","10":"tag-investigation","11":"tag-nhs","12":"tag-police","13":"tag-report","14":"tag-speak","15":"tag-staff","16":"tag-trust"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13350","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13350"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13350\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13351"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13350"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13350"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13350"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Contact us about this story<\/h4>\n