Essex Partnership NHS Trust: Photos appear to show staff asleep on duty

This image was taken the day before a critical CQC report came out highlighting staff sleeping on duty

Photographs have emerged that appear to show staff at a mental health trust asleep while keeping watch on vulnerable patients.

It comes as the Care Quality Commission (CQC) criticised the Essex Partnership NHS Trust (EPUT) in a report which highlighted staff sleeping on duty.

Two of the images were taken on Tuesday, the day before the CQC report came out.

EPUT said it was investigating the matter urgently.

The BBC has seen the metadata of the pictures, which confirms the date, time and location as 06:20 BST on 11 July, in a ward run by EPUT.

A third picture from another patient purports to show EPUT staff members asleep while again carrying out observations, with the location given as Southend Hospital.

The date provided was 12 March 2023 - but the BBC has been unable to independently verify this information.

A picture purporting to be an EPUT staff member asleep while observing a patient at Southend Hospital has been given to the BBC

The CQC report detailed 20 incidents in the six months to December last year where the trust had recorded staff members falling asleep while on duty.

The trust told inspectors it took a fortnight to access CCTV images which prevented follow-up action.

A family member of a former patient said: "I walked in to see my loved one on one-to-one observation while the person doing this was asleep.

"I was fuming. He was there to keep him safe. I reported the staff member firstly to another nurse, who just shrugged her shoulders and said 'he's tired and bored'."

The trust's overall rating was downgraded from "good" to "requires improvement" following the recent inspections.

It is also at the centre of a public inquiry looking into the deaths of patients in the care of Essex mental health services, between 2000 and 2020.

The outgoing inquiry chair said they had received evidence that 2,000 people in contact with the services had died during that period, although that figure has been disputed by EPUT's chief executive, Paul Scott.

A spokesman said: "We're investigating the issue raised as a matter of urgency.

"The care and safety of our patients is our top priority and while the vast majority of our staff are fully engaged at all times, we take all reports of this nature seriously and fully investigate in line with our policies."

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