Oswestry's orthopaedic hospital 'highly commended' at awards

The Robert Jones and Agnes Hunt Orthopaedic Hospital (RJAH) received the praise in the acute or specialist trust of the year category at the Health Service Journal Awards.

The winner of the category was St Helens and Knowsley Teaching Hospitals Trust – with RJAH the only trust to get a commendation, from a shortlist of eight organisations.

The special recognition for staff at the Oswestry-based hospital comes just months after the trust received a glowing report from the Care Quality Commission (CQC), where it was rated as 'good’ overall, and ‘outstanding' for care.

Mark Brandreth, chief executive at RJAH, said: "Being awarded highly commended in our category was truly the icing on the cake of what's been a fantastic year for us.

"We are lucky to have, in my view, the best staff in the NHS, and I'd like to congratulate everyone for all their hard work. This achievement truly is testament to our consistently high levels of patient experience and outcomes.

'Amazing'

"Not only can I say we are the best hospital in our region, it certainly means we are the best specialist hospital in the country – what an amazing thing to be able to say, as chief executive.

"As well as our fantastic CQC report earlier this year, we also saw our patients return what were the best overall set of results in the country in the latest national inpatient survey, so all in all, it's been a pretty amazing year for us."

This was the third year in succession that RJAH made the shortlist in this category.

The trust was also a finalist in a new category for this year – the reservist support initiative award, which recognised the trust's efforts of working with the armed forces.

Newcastle Hospitals was the winner of the category.

Mr Brandreth added: "I'd like to take this opportunity to congratulate the winners and fellow finalists.

"I'm sure everyone would agree we were all up against some extremely tough competition."