A watchdog has criticised a mental health service over staff shortages, risks to people waiting for care and poor medicine management.
The Care Quality Commission (CQC) said the community-based service for working-age adults in Hull and East Yorkshire, run by the Humber Teaching NHS Foundation Trust, “requires improvement”.
It follows an inspection in March, when the CQC found there were not always enough qualified or experienced staff and the service did not always make sure that medicines and treatments were safe and met people’s needs.
The trust said it welcomed the report and was working to address many of the issues raised.
Inspectors found the service did not make sure that everyone could access the care, support and treatment they needed, when they needed it, and people struggled to access out-of-hours support.
Concerns were also raised about medicine management, with two service users telling inspectors they had not had regular reviews of their medication and had stopped taking it.
The report said the service did not have good management arrangements to deliver good-quality care, while leaders did not always act on information about risk to help keep people safe.
In addition, the service did not always ensure there was continuity of care, including when patients moved to the service from a different mental health team.
According to the report, one person had been waiting two years for treatment after moving from an adolescent team to the adult team.
However, while the watchdog reported six breaches of regulations, it said the service was caring and staff treated people with compassion and kindness.