WARRINGTON Hospital remains under enhanced monitoring by the General Medical Council after trainees raised safety concerns.

The General Medical Council has expressed concerns over the training of students at the hospital, which is working with the health board in order to make improvements.

Trainees in geriatric medicine, acute internal medicine and core medical training placed at Warrington Hospital raised safety concerns over the loss of ‘substantive’ consultants and the ‘variable quality’ of locum consultants, which was described as a ‘major concern’.

Warrington and Halton Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust was placed in to enhanced monitoring in July 2015 after no improvements were made, with an action plan outlined soon afterwards.

Actions included monitoring the ratio of supervisors to trainees, trainee satisfaction ratings and the percentage of consultant reviews of admissions within 14 hours, with the GMC and Health Education England North West visiting the hospital in January.

The GMC stated that the management were ‘aware of the scale of the concerns’ and were looking to recruit to senior positions but that ‘clear strategies to resolve the concerns were not apparent’.

Enhanced monitoring and support will be provided until the GMC believes that the issue is resolve and that changes are sustainable.

A spokesman for Warrington and Halton Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust said: “Warrington and Halton Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust welcomes cohorts of junior doctors each year who are at various stages of their training.

“We have an excellent track record in educating the future senior medical workforce and are proud of the fact that many of our consultants were trained here.

“The competence of our support and education of these doctors, who are an integral part of the medical workforce, is inspected by the General Medical Council annually when evidence of trainees’ progress throughout each stage of their speciality training is examined and monitored.

“The process is underpinned by appraisal, assessment and annual job planning.

“We were reviewed in the summer of 2015 and notified of pressures the trainees identified in geriatric and acute internal medicine and some of the difficulties they were encountering.”

Warrington Hospital says that ‘good progress’ has been made in alleviating the GMC’s concerns, with another visit expected next year.

Their spokesman added: “We immediately implemented some of the recommendations and the vast majority of our patients now have a consultant review within 14 hours of admission, most handover meetings are now consultant led and trainee doctors are timetabled to learn in clinic sessions with consultants each week.

“HEENW revisited the trust in January 2016 and noted that good progress had been made and that work continues to achieve all the key performance indicators.

“A further update was recently given to HEENW from the trust and we expect another review visit in May 2017.””