HEALTH watchdogs were shocked to find patient records on show when they swooped on a hospital's accident and emergency unit.

They found confidentiality was not being maintained at the Burnley General Hospital department where patients' names, diagnosis and medications were displayed.

The health authority quality check team ordered hospital bosses to discontinue the practice immediately at the nurses' station which is passed by hundreds of patients each day.

But health trust managers will argue the point - stating that abbreviations make the information meaningless to the untrained eye and they are using a system carried out at other hospitals.

The quality team said it was also unhappy with the practice of assessing two patients at the same time separated only by a single curtain - potentially breaching confidentiality.

The cases are among 11 points of concern raised by the performance monitoring team from the health authority which finances the services carried out by the hospital. Investigators also witnessed a swab being discarded wrongly and told managers to take immediate action to ensure that further breaches of infection control policy are reduced.

That incident, say hospital managers, was an isolated occurance.

They also felt they were casualties of a bad day because the necessary notice warning patients how long they were likely to wait wasn't working when the investigators called.

The inquiry team found staff confused over the procedures for dealing with relatives of "dead on arrival" patients.

Members insisted that the best possible care was maintained for relatives and friends in these cases.

Trust spokesman, Mrs Val Smith, said a clear caring policy was, in fact, in place.

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