Health trust running unit which saw abuse faces NHS intervention

A mental health trust that runs a unit where patients were mistreated is to face the highest level of intervention from NHS England, the body has said.

A BBC Panorama investigation found a "toxic culture of humiliation, verbal abuse and bullying" at the Edenfield Centre in Prestwich, Bury.

NHS England said it would be helped by the Recovery Support Programme (RSP).

The BBC's investigation into the centre, which was broadcast in September, found patients were put at risk.

Staff were filmed using restraint inappropriately and swearing at and slapping patients, while some of those being cared for endured long seclusions in small, bare rooms.

Since the broadcast, some staff have been sacked or suspended as a result of formal disciplinary procedures at the trust.

GMMH's outgoing chairman Rupert Nichols previously said it was facing "significant challenges" after "inexcusable behaviour" at the unit.

In a letter to Mr Nichols and chief executive Neil Thwaite, which has been seen by the BBC, NHS England's chief operating officer Sir David Sloman said the RSP, which has replaced its previous special measures scheme, gave a "collaborative, system-focused approach for supporting those providers and systems with the toughest challenges".

It will see NHS England provide "intensive support to the trust to make the improvements it needs including, notably, appointing an improvement director", he said.

He said the body will also commission an independent review into the failings identified within the trust's services and the "failure within the organisation to escalate concerns".

He also said the decision was "not a reflection of all those staff who have worked so tirelessly for patients", but was "an opportunity for us all to work together to build better and more sustainable services".

He added that GMMH will receive a "support package" which will include the deployment of a "multi-disciplinary team", while the overall oversight and co-ordination of plan will be led by a senior NHS director.

A GMMH representative said its board was "committed to providing the best quality care" and "welcomed" the independent review.

They said the review would "bring some clarity and reassurance to those we care for, and the public, regarding the ongoing safety of the services we deliver".

"We will engage openly and thoroughly with this work," they added.

NHS England's actions were welcomed by mental health charity Mind, but campaigns director Vicki Nash said the organisation's "concerns about safety at mental health hospitals go beyond conditions at a single trust".

She said that since the BBC investigation, further reports had "emerged of mental health hospitals across England failing to keep people safe and treat them with dignity and respect when they are at their most unwell".

"The crisis in our mental health hospitals is a wider, systemic issue about culture and safety," she said.

She added that a public inquiry was needed "to find out why these failings have taken place, how they've gone uncovered for so long, and the action needed to be taken to make the services fit for purpose".

A BBC Panorama undercover investigation has found evidence that a secure NHS psychiatric hospital is failing to protect some of its vulnerable patients.