CQC inspectors were forced to seek assistance for distressed patients during an inspection of St Mary’s Hospital, prompting the regulator to issue a Warning Notice to Isle of Wight NHS Trust.
The Care Quality Commission (CQC) carried out an unannounced inspection of urgent and emergency care and medical care at the Isle of Wight hospital in February as part of its Winter Pressures Programme.
While St Mary’s Hospital remains rated Good overall, urgent and emergency care has again been rated Requires Improvement. Inspectors identified breaches of regulations relating to safe care and treatment, the hospital environment and governance, while medical care was re-rated Good.
The CQC said it was particularly concerned that staff had limited visibility of patients waiting to be seen in the Emergency Department, leaving them unable to respond quickly if someone’s condition deteriorated. During the inspection, inspectors were forced to intervene after observing distressed patients in the waiting room, seeking assistance because staff were unable to effectively monitor those waiting to be seen.
The regulator has now issued a Warning Notice requiring the Trust to improve the clinical management of the waiting room.
Inspectors also found patients were regularly being cared for in corridor spaces, with some beds positioned across the entrances to treatment cubicles, potentially delaying emergency access to other patients when urgent treatment was needed.
Further concerns were raised over mental health safety within the department, with inspectors finding there were no ligature-free toilets available and that environmental risks had not been adequately managed for people experiencing a mental health crisis.
Patients were also facing significant delays, with the Trust failing to meet the NHS target of seeing people within 4 hours of arriving at A&E. Some patients waited more than 12 hours for an inpatient bed after the decision had been made to admit them.
Inspectors also identified serious safeguarding concerns. Training compliance for Adult Safeguarding Level 3 had fallen to just 39%, well below the Trust’s own target. During the inspection, 5 of the 6 staff members questioned were unable to explain the Trust’s process for responding to a safeguarding disclosure.
Staffing pressures were also found to be affecting patient care. Between June 2025 and February 2026, the Trust logged 121 staffing-related incidents linked to vacancies, sickness, workload pressures, unavailable bank staff and short-notice absences. Inspectors said patients assessed as needing one-to-one observation could not always receive it because of staffing shortages.
Despite the concerns, inspectors praised many aspects of care elsewhere in the hospital. Medical care, including older people’s services, has been re-rated Good, with the CQC highlighting compassionate staff, a positive learning culture and strong leadership.
Patients consistently described staff as kind and respectful, while the hospital achieved a 98% positive Friends and Family Test score over the previous 12 months.
Catherine Campbell, Deputy Director of Hospitals, Secondary and Specialist Care in the South West at the CQC, has said:
“At this inspection of St Mary’s Hospital, we found an emergency department where too many people faced long waits in unsuitable environments.
“Inspectors were concerned that staff had limited visibility of the waiting room and wouldn’t be able to respond quickly if people deteriorated. In fact, inspectors had to seek help for some distressed people during this visit.
“We found the trust wasn’t meeting the NHS standard for seeing people within four hours of them arriving at the emergency department. There were also long waits for people who were being admitted to hospital, with some people waiting more than 12 hours for a bed.
“We identified a number of environmental risks that leaders hadn’t addressed. Staff regularly had to place people in corridor spaces, which blocked access to cubicles and could delay timely access in the event of an emergency.
“We’ve told leaders where we expect to see rapid and continued improvements and issued a Warning Notice to focus their attention on the most urgent concern.”
The CQC said Isle of Wight NHS Trust has since submitted an action plan and provided assurances that work is underway to address the issues identified during the inspection.
Joe Robertson MP, for Isle of Wight East, says:
“I am sadly unsurprised by the CQC’s findings in relation to emergency care at St Mary’s Hospital. When I visited earlier in the year, I saw for myself people being treated on rows of trolleys and in unsuitable places like a converted cupboard. There were also ambulances parked outside with patients still in them because there was no space in the building. The staff were doing their absolute best in impossible circumstances.
“But the fact remains that one of the biggest contributing factors to this desperate situation is a crisis in social care meaning that people cannot be discharged to a safe home environment and around 25 percent of beds on the wards are occupied by people who do not have a medical reason for being there. Until the Government grasps this issue by better supporting our Council the crisis will not be solved. The Island is not a city. The funding rules that apply elsewhere do not work for us and the unique challenges we face.”
half the people in the A and E are entitled layabouts, that cant get GP appointments so clog up A and E
also, there would be plenty of staff available, if the idiots in the govt didn’t keep inviting illegals in and the idiots in the council didn’t keep approving house builds with no infrastructure to support.
Well… I’ve been there a few times and personally witnessed staff just sitting around and chatting rather than paying any mind to patients. Reported I was in there previously with a gentleman who was suspected to have sepsis and was still made to sit and wait for 12 hours, with only paracetamol administered once in that time. It’s a complete shambles and a waste of time up there.
The place is nothing more than an open waiting room, and not fit for purpose. The problem is, it is not the staff’s fault, they can only work with what they have got, and dare not make any complaint to management because they risk loosing their job. Not just that, but any nurse who has earned recognized top grade training, is lucky to get a job in any UK hospital, they would rather employ foriegn
The place is nothing more than an open waiting room, and not fit for purpose. The problem is, it is not the staff’s fault, they can only work with what they have got, and dare not make any complaint to management because they risk loosing their job. Not just that, but any nurse who has earned recognized top grade training, is lucky to get a job in any UK hospital, they would rather employ foreign nurses and doctors, not that there is any lower grade in their skill, but they can be employed by the NHS at a cheaper rate. The grade of the A&E department in it’s comforting of sick or injured patients and the waiting to get treated is an absolute disgrace, and it is a miracle that more don’t die, just waiting to get that treatment
They employ a load of layabouts.
Personally I would sack the majority of them.
This is what happens when hundreds of beds are removed and wards are closed to make room for administration offices
I had the misfortune of having to be admitted as an emergency, the ambulance call centre arranged a video consultation with a doctor and he authorised an emergency ambulance to get me, that arrived over 4 hours later by which time i had lost over a litre of blood.
On arrival at A&E they could not take me in for 30 minutes and i was briefly spoken to by a nurse who had very poor understanding of english, i used to work in the health service and told her i was going into shock due to blood loss and was ignored, i was put in a consulting room where the examination couch had been removed with 4 other patients, several much more seriously ill than me, we had no way of summoning help if an emergency occurred and no staff checked on us.
i was sat on a hard plastic chair for 24 hours before i could be given a bed, the nurse who admitted me to the ward took my blood pressure and immediately had me lay flat and raised the foot of the bed as my blood pressure showed i was in shock.
The ward staff and medical staff on St Helens ward were amazing but A&E is a disgusting disgrace manned by barely competent staff who have no interest in patient care, given that all seriously ill patients have to go to the mainland i don’t think St Marys should be called a hospital, it is not fit for purpose and run by vast numbers of utterly incompetent managers.
Further to my earlier post i should also point out that none of us in that room were offered fluids or food at any time during the 24 hours i was stuck in A&E
How can it even be justified as an A&E department, when you wait 4 or more hours for an ambulance, and once your’e there, a further 24 hours to get any treatment? There are no beds in the place for sick or injured people. How the hell it would ever cope with multiple injuries or badly hurt people just doesn’t bare thinking about, and to have no beds for them, you’d be safer at the vets!
It’s about time some heads rolled
THE NO HOPE SERVICE STRIKES AGAIN
And this has just been recognised!?!
The state of services have been shocking for years in my opinion. Recently it has got worse, yes too many staff who haven’t any idea of what to do in situations needing prompt response because they don’t understand English. It’s not being racist it’s a common fact. What’s the point in going to induction if you don know shat you’re learning?
A&E shiny new department but it’s not fit for purpose, people are left for too long or not seen or treated well from the start it’s as though they’ve no training at all.
Too many doors staff all keep disappearing into and are never seen again. Management of this area is really below standard and was a former employee.
The wards are also in a similar state, patient care is terrible and needs urgent attention as well. Not enough communication at all and care is just a word that most seem to not understand.
First hand experience of this.
The good ones are overshadowed by the incompetence of the majority. Where are all the decent home grown nurses and other staff these days? Give them an incentive to work in their own country or just work!!! That’d be a start!