King's Mill Hospital bucks NHS recruitment crisis

Figures from NHS Digital show more than 33,000 nurses walked away last year, a rise of 20 per cent since 2012-13 and showing there are more leavers than joiners.

However, Sherwood Forest Hospitals NHS Trust, which runs King’s Mill in Sutton and Mansfield Community Hospital, said its number of nursing vacancies had actually fallen in the last 12 months.

It said it currently had 126 vacancies for band five registered nurses, meaning 16.8 per cent of positions were unfilled, compared with 159 vacancies, or 20.7 per cent in August 2016.

Phillip Bolton, deputy chief nurse, said: “Over the last year, we have been really successful in both recruiting and retaining nursing staff. 

“We have been proactive in running targeted and flexible recruitment campaigns, for example offering regular assessment centres where potential nurses can visit the hospital, be assessed, interviewed and offered a job in all in one morning or

afternoon.    

“Since the trust launched its nursing recruitment campaign and raised the rate of pay for bank staff – an internal rota for staff who wish to pick up extra shifts – the trust has reduced its agency spend with a projected annual saving of £3.1m on agency nursing.

“The campaign focuses our commitment to recruit more qualified nurses as one of our main priorities is to recruit more permanent staff as we work toward our vision of providing outstanding care to our patients.

“It’s a really exciting time to be joining the trust and we have many development opportunities for our staff.

“Nursing staff at the hospital have worked closely with clinical and other colleagues and have been a driving force in improving patient care and services across the trust and we hope to build on this as we recruit more nursing staff into the Trust.”   

SFH provides acute healthcare services for 420,000 people across Mansfield, Ashfield, Newark, Sherwood and parts of Derbyshire and Lincolnshire, employing 4,500 people across its three sites – King’s Mill, Mansfield and Newark Hospital.

In the last financial year there were 412,000 outpatient attendances and 102,000 people attended King’s Mill’s emergency departmentment.