Midlands patients still forced to use mixed-sex wards

Hundreds of patients in the West Midlands and Staffordshire were forced to share hospital wards with members of the opposite sex in the space of 12 months, despite a crackdown on the practice.

The Government started fining trusts that failed to provide same sex accommodation last year. But between April 2011 and March this year there were 632 breaches recorded by Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust and 109 at Sandwell and West Birmingham Hospitals NHS Trust.

There were 56 breaches recorded by the trust that manages Walsall Manor Hospital and four by the trust which manages New Cross Hospital.

Trusts have been warned by the Department of Health they will be fined £250 for each patient forced to stay on a mixed-sex ward.

Mid Staffordshire NHS spokesman Claire Hall did not reveal how much the breaches equated to in fines.

But she insisted the data needed to be put in context, pointing out that if, for example, one woman was in a bay with three men, that would count as four breaches.

Sandwell and West Birmingham Hospitals NHS Trust has spent £3 million refurbishing six wards so men and women patients could be cared for separately.

A further £1.4m a year is being spent staffing them.

Trust spokesman Jessamy Kinghorn said: "We only place patients in wards or bays of the opposite sex if there are no beds of their gender available and they need to be admitted to hospital for urgent treatment.

"On the few occasions we have placed patients in wards of the opposite sex, it was more important to ensure they got the urgent treatment they needed quickly, rather than wait for a bed of the right gender."

Walsall Hospitals NHS Trust has been fined £17,250 for its 56 breaches.

Royal Wolverhampton Hospitals NHS Trust spokesman Jo Nicholls declined to reveal how much the trust was fined. There were no breaches at Dudley's Russells Hall Hospital.

By David Lumb