Broadmoor systems 'put patients at risk'
Updated on 21 July 2009
A major investigation into the trust which runs Broadmoor high-security hospital claims its systems are so seriously flawed that it is putting patients at risk. Andy Davies has this exclusive report.
The Care Quality Commission report highlights mediocre standards of care and buildings that are "totally unfit for purpose".
Next month another report will be published into a killing at Broadmoor in 2004. Its findings, Channel 4 News understands, are even more critical.
And now, alarmingly, this programme has learned that the management at Broadmoor even had to write to staff recently to remind them to lock up some of their most dangerous patients.
On the day that Broadmoor comes under fire from the Care Quality Commission (CQC) watchdog, Channel 4 News has discovered that staff on the hospital’s Dangerous and Severe Personality Disorder Unit (DSPD) recently forgot to lock some of the hospital’s most dangerous patients in their rooms during a nightshift.
Broadmoor’s DSPD unit houses around 50 of Britain’s most dangerous offenders; all are repeated violent or sexual offenders, some murderers, deemed to pose an immediate danger to others.
In a recent incident, Channel 4 News has discovered that staff forgot to lock up at least one patient housed in the DSPD unit overnight as they are required to do. Channel 4 News understands that the alarm was only raised after a patient walked out of his room in the middle of the night and told staff that he should probably be locked in.
Confirming that patients’ rooms have gone unlocked, Nigel McCorkell, chairman of the West London Mental Health Trust which manages Broadmoor, has told Channel 4 News that "Since that occurred, staff have been reminded in writing that that is an unacceptable thing to happen."
He told Channel 4 News: "The patients in question were not locked up at night as they are required to be so, and one of the patients pointed this out to a member of staff."
Mr McCorkell said that he had been told that "it happened on one or two occasions".
Channel 4 News also understands that in a separate incident in March this year, and revealed in a managerial email obtained by Channel 4 News, the unit again appeared vulnerable when only half the staff turned up for their shift.
According to the email, "Only 6 out of the planned 12 staff turned up for night shift at DSPD last night. Different reasons were given by each member of staff for not attending".
Mr McCorkell has told the programme that "They may have perfectly good reasons for not arriving on the shift,” and “We have access to other staff either within the hospital or on call to fill gaps."
All of this comes ahead of another report, to be published next month into the killing of Richard Loudwell by Peter Bryan at Broadmoor in 2004.
Its findings, Channel 4 News understands, will also be highly critical of Broadmoor, highlighting systemic failures. The report will investigate how Peter Bryan was allowed to go unobserved to kill fellow inmate Richard Loudwell, despite dismembering a previous murder victim, Brian Cherry, and eating part of his brain less than six weeks earlier.
