Hospital boss 'sorry failings at Stafford were missed'

The chief NHS regulator has apologised for missing clues to appalling levels of care at Stafford Hospital that developed into the worst health service scandal for a decade.

Cynthia Bower, chief executive of the Care Quality Commission (CQC), said that the West Midlands Strategic Health Authority, which she had headed between 2006 and 2008, had missed warning signs such as complaints from patients about the treatment they received.

An inquiry into the Mid-Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust reported last year that at least 400 patients may have died due to neglect and poor care. Patients were left lying in soiled sheets, some so thirsty they drank water from flower vases, with food out of reach and basic medical observations neglected.

Yesterday, appearing before the second public inquiry into how the regulatory authorities failed to spot what was going wrong at the trust, She was made chief executive of West Midlands SHA in 2006, with responsibility for overseeing Mid-Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust, before being appointed to the UK's most senior health regulatory post as first chief executive of the Care Quality Commission in 2008.

She told the inquiry, chaired by Robert Francis QC, that it had been "distressing to learn of the failings of care at Mid-Staffordshire Hospital and I offer my utmost and unreserved sympathy to patients and their carers and families. "I am deeply sorry for what happened and for the fact we had oversight of the NHS in the region at that time and we didn't pick up failings in care."

In addition to complaints, there were other alarm signals, such as reports of poor care from the Health Care Commission, the CQC's predecessor, and of serious untoward incidents. But she said these were not enough to reveal what was going on.

"I wasn't conscious at the time there was intelligence that we could have put together that would have said there were major failings of care," she told the inquiry.

"I accept there were some issues we lost track of that would have generated more concern, but I don't accept there were serious failings to put the pieces together."

Ms Bower said the SHA did not have the capacity to have a detailed oversight of all of the region's health services. She said the last NHS reorganisation in 2006 had caused a big upheaval and staff cuts of 60 per cent.