THE Clinicenta private treatment centre at the Lister hospital, Stevenage, is to be brought back into the local NHS trust because of dangerous care and lack of care.
The government is to pay £54m to Carillion, the multinational construction company that owns Clinicenta Ltd, to hand back the treatment centre to East and North Herts NHS Trust. £47m is to pay for the building and £7.7m for the contract.
The care was so bad that local GPs became worried in April 2012 and began reducing the referral of patients to the centre.
GPs noted inadequate follow-up of patients with serious eye conditions such as glaucoma, such that six patients were thought to have irreversibly lost their sight.
Contributing to this disaster was the loss of 8,500 ophthalmology out-patient medical records.
By October 2012, the East and North Herts Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) became aware that there were 21 ‘serious incidents’ to do with clinical care or inadequate medical records at the private treatment centre.
There were also three deaths after routine planned surgery. It appears that the patients received inadequate post-operative care and clinical cover at the centre, which does not have an intensive care unit. Patients were belatedly transferred to the ICU at the adjacent Lister hospital.
Patient safety concerns were raised with the Care Quality Commission (CQC) which started proceedings in July to remove the licence from Clinicenta-Carillion to operate the Surgicentre.
The Carillion Surgicentre was opened in early 2012.
The public-private partnership deal was signed in April 2009 for £153m; £31m for the building with 26 short stay in-patient beds, six operating theatres, some outpatients including ophthalmology facilities and some day surgery facilities and £122m for the five-year support services contract.
The Labour government set up arrangements with private treatment centres whereby they would be paid even if they did not perform the amount of work expected of them. These minimum volume payments could be as much as £1m a month.