I'm coming to this a bit late, but here is the report: The Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust Inquiry. Click through to download the report (in two volumes). An excerpt from the news release:
The final report into the care provided by Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust was published today. The Inquiry Chairman, Robert Francis QC, concluded that patients were routinely neglected by a Trust that was preoccupied with cost cutting, targets and processes and which lost sight of its fundamental responsibility to provide safe care.
Robert Francis QC has made 18 recommendations for both the Trust and Government. His final report is based on evidence from over 900 patients and families who contacted the Inquiry with their views.
The evidence gathered by the Inquiry shows clearly that for many patients the most basic elements of care were neglected. Calls for help to use the bathroom were ignored and patients were left lying in soiled sheeting and sitting on commodes for hours, often feeling ashamed and afraid.
Patients were left unwashed, at times for up to a month. Food and drinks were left out of the reach of patients and many were forced to rely on family members for help with feeding. Staff failed to make basic observations and pain relief was provided late or in some cases not at all. Patients were too often discharged before it was appropriate, only to have to be re-admitted shortly afterwards.
The standards of hygiene were at times awful, with families forced to remove used bandages and dressings from public areas and clean toilets themselves for fear of catching infections.Reaction in the British media has been angry. Here's a report in The Independent, and another in The Guardian.
This is important worldwide, because any serious outbreak of infectious disease will hit the hospital system very hard. A bad hospital will only make things much worse.
