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Safeguarding

University Hospitals Bristol and Weston NHS Foundation Trust (UHBW) was formed on 1 April 2020 following the merger of University Hospitals Bristol NHS Foundation Trust and Weston Area Health NHS Trust.

The information on this page is historic. Visit the UHBW About us pages for the latest information. 

 

The Trust is committed to ensuring that all of our patients and their families are cared for in a safe, secure and caring environment. The protection of vulnerable children and adults at risk from abuse and neglect is embedded within all services provided by the Trust across all hospital sites.

A number of safeguarding vulnerable people arrangements are in place, in line with legislation, best practice and local commissioning arrangements, detailed as follow:

  • The Trust is compliant with statutory responsibilities, national and local guidance, Care Quality Commission registration and commissioning standards. Evidence of compliance is reported quarterly and annually.
  • The Trust has clear lines of safeguarding accountability in place, which are accessible and promoted to staff. The Chief Nurse is the Executive Lead for Safeguarding Vulnerable People and chairs the Safeguarding Steering Group. The Trust has Named Professionals in place who lead on safeguarding issues, acting on behalf of the Executive Lead for Safeguarding.
  • The Trust Board reviews safeguarding across the organisation at least once a year, through the Safeguarding Annual report. There is a robust safeguarding work and audit plan to ensure that safeguarding systems and processes are working effectively.
  • Staff are trained to a level appropriate to their role and responsibilities based on the Inter-collegiate documents for adults and children and Working Together 2018.
  • Safeguarding policies and procedures are in place in line with national and local guidance, and reviewed on a regular basis. This includes safe recruitment policies which are in line with the statutory requirements to carry out Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) checks. Safeguarding information is available to staff through a dedicated intranet site.
  • The Trust has a robust process in place to follow up children who miss hospital appointments, to ensure their health is not affected in any way.
  • Processes are in place for the management of allegations against staff including the availability of a Trust Allegations Officer, in line with statutory guidance. Staff are encouraged to raise any concerns.
  • All staff have access to Safeguarding Supervision or reflective practice appropriate to their role and responsibilities.
  • The Trust contributes to National and Local Child Safeguarding Practice Reviews, Safeguarding Adults Reviews, Domestic Homicide Reviews and other multi agency reviews, developing action plans and monitoring their implementation.
  • Staff are fully engaged in multi-agency working, including information sharing to effectively safeguard. This includes a system for flagging children who are subject to a Child Protection Plan and the implementation of the national Child Protection Information Sharing System (CP-IS) in unscheduled care settings

October 2019