4th August 2011 - Airedale named as one of the country's top 40 hospitals

Airedale Hospital was presented with an award today (Wednesday 3 August) after being named as one of the 40 Top hospitals by CHKS - an independent provider of healthcare intelligence and quality improvement services.

The CHKS Top Hospitals programme is now in its eleventh year and aims to celebrate excellence in the NHS. The 40 Top Hospitals award is made to clients of CHKS and is based on an evaluation of 20 indicators of clinical effectiveness, health outcomes, efficiency, patient experience and quality of care.

Bridget Fletcher, Chief Executive of Airedale NHS Foundation Trust said: “We are delighted to be named as one of the 40 best performing hospitals in the UK – especially as we have been judged against criteria that we feel is equally important to both our staff and patients.

“We could not have achieved this success without the dedication of our staff who are committed to providing the best care possible for patients.”

James Coles, director of research, CHKS which is part of the Capita Group, said: “Airedale NHS Foundation Trust is one of our 40 Top hospitals for 2011. These awards recognise outstanding performance in the areas which we believe are critical to delivering good patient care.”

Alongside the awards, CHKS is publishing a series of five reports that focus on the themes of: quality and change, safety, leadership, organisational culture and external influence. These reports aim to help hospital managers get a better understanding of what is happening in high-performing trusts so they can share insight through case studies, rather than work in isolation. The second report on safety report has just been published, while the first on quality and change has been available since May. The other three reports are due to be published before May 2012. For more details visit http://tophospitals.chks.co.uk/index.php