LONDON Patients are twice as likely to die in some hospitals than in others, according to a report by Dr Foster Research, a health information company.

Despite falling mortality rates in NHS hospitals, vast disparities between the 152 hospital trusts analysed were reported. Researchers said that 7,400 lives could have been saved if hospitals with higher than expected mortality levels had reduced them at the expected rate. The Royal Free Hospital NHS Trust in North London was the best-performing, with a mortality rate 26 per cent lower than the expected rate. The highest mortality level was found at George Eliot Hospital Trust in Nuneaton, Warwickshire, 43 per cent above the expected level. Of 152 trusts only 7 had not reduced rates in the past five years. Factors affecting rates were infections, medical error and failure of “quality of care”.

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