We visited six wards during our inspection and talked to the ward manager and the pharmacist who regularly visited the ward. We found that there was a good working relationship between the pharmacy team and nurses on these wards. Pharmacists reconciled medicines for every new patient (this means that pharmacists checked that a patient received the medicines they had been taking before they came into hospital, unless there was a reason for stopping or changing a medicine).

We did not speak with people that use the services about the Outcomes assessed in this report. We did speak with staff and it was commented that the improvements that have been implemented by the trust has made implementing certain care processes more efficient and lessened the amount of paper-work needed.

We visited Maplebeck, Ashbrook, Oakburn, Thornton, Clover wards and the Step Forwards centre and spoke with patients, their relatives and staff and reviewed case notes. We also observed care being delivered. We also visited in the evening and invited patients, staff and visitors to speak with us about their experiences.

Most patients on the wards told us they were informed about their care and treatment, had attended meetings about their care and were satisfied. They were complementary about the care they had received and explained how the staff had helped them “recover". Most patients said they understood why they were in hospital and they told us staff explained about their treatment “quite often” and staff “tell us what is happening".

We found the Trust had systems in place to monitor the quality of the services it delivered at Lynfield Mount. There was an overarching service governance committee, chaired by a non-executive director, which was underpinned by service-led locality governance groups. The committee discussed amongst other things serious incidents, complaints and patient experience. We saw these were also discussed at a ward team level and we were told by the staff that each ward team met twice a month to discuss these areas.

We found the Trust had identified areas where improvements were needed and had taken action. For example they had plans in place to improve staff training.