The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has published its full well-led report following an inspection in January 2025.
The report highlights significant improvement in culture, learning and patient experience, as well as positive feedback from our partners and stakeholders, resulting in a rating of Good. This is an improvement from LUHFT’s previous well-led rating of Inadequate in 2021.
For the purposes of CQC regulation, Liverpool University Hospitals NHS FT and Liverpool Women’s NHS FT are still considered as separate statutory entities and this inspection was of LUHFT hospital sites, however the CQC report acknowledges that the Group Board now covers both trusts.
Inspectors noted that it was clear there is an inclusive positive culture of learning and improvement. They also praised leadership teams for proactively empowering staff and collaborating with partners to deliver care that is safe, integrated, person-centred and sustainable, and worked to reduce inequalities. There was also an emphasis on safe working environments and how staff feel comfortable to speak up, without being prompted to do so.
The CQC did highlight areas for improvement, including ensuring there are equal opportunities for staff with protected equality characteristics and those from excluded and marginalised groups.
James Sumner, Group Chief Executive at UHL Group said: “This is an incredible achievement for our organisation and one that follows a considerable period of change within our leadership and governance models. I know that this has also taken a huge shift in our way of working across the organisation moving to an approach that focuses on risk in order to drive improvement, so I would like to thank colleagues for their commitment to adopting the new approach and embedding it, and for their work in helping us reach this point.”
The report will be available on the CQC website.
This was a focused well-led inspection of LUHFT. The overall rating of the organisation remains Requires Improvement, and the CQC will need to complete an inspection of all core services in order for this to change.