THE organisation in charge of delivering mental health services in Worcestershire has been forced to drop its plans to become a foundation trust after standards were found to have slipped.

Worcestershire Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust’s rating for quality and financial management has plummeted from ‘excellent’ to ‘weak’ in just one year.

Bosses have now been forced to put the timetable for change back about six months because they have to demonstrate the trust can operate to a high enough standard over a lengthy period of time.

Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust, which runs the county’s hospitals, is still on course to achieve FT status.

It had previously been hoped Worcestershire Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust would become an FT this autumn but the results of the Care Quality Commission’s (CQC) rigorous assessment, which we reported in your Worcester News on Thursday, October 15, have put paid to that.

At the county’s health overview and scrutiny committee meeting Dr Ros Keeton, chief executive of the trust, said: “The application to become a foundation trust will be delayed. The reality of that is we need to demonstrate to you and everybody else that we have improved our performance and can sustain that. The application won’t go forward before the election now.”

A foundation trust is still part of the NHS but it has far more control over its budget, can forge closer links with the private sector and, like a failing business, can go bust.

Dr Keeton said the score was pulled down by a failure to meet two national targets – the access to intensive support at home and the number of people receiving follow-up contact within seven days of being discharged from psychiatric in-patient care – but added these targets were now being met.

Dr Keeton said while there were many good things going on within the trust she had no excuse for this year’s poor rating.