Care Quality Commission

The aim of the Care Quality Commission is to ensure people experience services that meet fundamental standards of quality and safety and respect their dignity and rights.

The Care Quality Commission inspected The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre in June 2016 and found staff were “enthusiastic about the care they provided” with a “tangible sense of willingness to go the extra mile”.

The report stated: “The positivity and compassion shown by staff and reflected in the feedback from patients was outstanding.”

The Trust was rated as outstanding in all areas for its care.

The inspectors also praised the leadership of the Trust, its clear strategy, and a number of treatment innovations that have been introduced.

They included a rapid chemotherapy chair to speed up waiting times and the Chemotherapy at Home programme, which sees cancer patients being treated in their own homes.

The inspectors said of the latter: “This service embodied the overall Trust and service vision of providing the best cancer care to their patients.”

Also singled out for praise was the prescribing of Adjuvant Zoledronatec - or bisphosphonates – a bone strengthening drug that has been found to prevent the spread of some newly diagnosed breast cancers and is the subject of a campaign by a cancer charity to make it more widely available.

The CQC said this innovation was “market leading” and ensured “patients with breast cancer were receiving the very latest evidence based treatment to reduce their risk of death and reoccurrence”.

In chemotherapy staff were praised for being passionate and committed.