Cambridgeshire Community Services NHS Trust

3. Dr L complains about the following actions of the Trust when it provided services for her daughter, Y, from March 2019 to July 2019. She states that:

· the Trust failed to communicate with her directly about Y’s speech and language assessment and did not involve her in any part of the process.

· the Trust failed to provide a full written report for Y’s assessment and failed to introduce a ‘sliding in’ technique

4. Dr L says because of the lack of communication, Y’s treatment and progress was delayed unnecessarily which has had an impact on her daughter’s emotional wellbeing and caused upset and frustration.

5. Dr L would like the Trust to update her daughter’s records to reflect that no written advice was provided in July 2019. She would also like her daughter to have access to Speech and Language services directly through a GP, and a treatment pathway to be put in place for children with selective mutism. Finally, she is seeking service improvements including a robust appointment system and regular updates for parents about their child’s progress and treatment plans.

6. Dr L’s daughter, Y, was referred to speech and language therapy (SALT) in March 2019 by her school. In May 2019 Y had an assessment with a SALT therapist in school which Dr L was not made aware of or invited to attend. A report for this assessment was issued in July 2019 and a copy was sent to both school and Dr L.

7. Dr L was unhappy with the report and raised concerns with the special educational needs coordinator (SENCO) at her daughter’s school. Dr L felt she was not getting the answers she wanted and raised a complaint with the Trust in December 2020. Dr L referred her complaint to us in November 2021.

9. The law says a person needs to make their complaint to us within a year of becoming aware of the problem. We cannot investigate complaints brought to us after one year, unless we consider there is a good reason to do so. We have discussed this with Dr L to understand the reasons why she could not bring her complaint sooner. We have also considered the time the Trust has taken to respond to Dr L.

10. Dr L first became aware of her concerns about her daughter’s SALT treatment in July 2019. This is when she found out there was no written report for her assessment, and she became aware that she had not been fully involved in this process. For her complaint to be in time, she would have needed to approach us no later than July 2020. We did not receive Dr L’s complaint form until November 2021. This means her complaint is one year and four months out of time.

11. Dr L raised a complaint to the Trust in December 2020. It sent a written response 13 January 2021. Dr L sent a further complaint letter on 25 January 2021 and the Trust sent a response in early March 2021. Another letter was issued to the Trust from Dr L on 22 March 2021 and the Trust sent its final response letter in May 2021. A face-to-face meeting was held on 12 July 2021. The Trust then closed the complaint and confirmed this by email on 29 July 2021.

12. Dr L did not submit her complaint to the Trust until December 2020. This is 16 months after her first date of awareness. We have asked Dr L about the delays and considered the reasons she told us she did not complain sooner.

13. Dr L felt that her complaints to us were new issues and not related to the events in July 2019. Dr L has told us on that basis she considers her complaint to be in time.

14. We have reviewed the complaint file for this case. Dr L’s initial complaint letter directly relates to the Speech and Language assessment which took place in July 2019. We can see the complaint raised with the Trust between December 2020 and March 2021 also relates to the same assessment.

15. We explored in more detail what Dr L meant by ‘new issues’ during our telephone conversation in June 2022. Dr L confirmed she knew she needed to complain about her daughter’s assessment, the poor communication and lack of treatment in July 2019. Dr L did not ask us to consider any other new complaints which do not relate to this period of care.

16. On this basis, we do not consider this to be a strong reason to set our time limit to one side. Dr L has not raised any new issues which she did not know about in July 2019. The complaint file indicates Dr L was aware of her concerns at the time of the events.

17. Dr L has also told us she submitted her initial complaint to the Trust in July 2019. We have independently reviewed the complaint file and can find no evidence of this. We asked Dr L to provide us with evidence she submitted her complaint earlier. She did not.

18. The evidence shows Dr L submitted a formal complaint to the Trust in December 2020. This is one year and four months after she became aware of her concerns and is a significant amount of time. It would be reasonable to expect Dr L to have chased this with the Trust if she had not received an acknowledgement or response. This is a significant delay where Dr L did not pursue her complaint and we have not seen a strong reason to account for the delay.

19. Dr L says she could not submit her complaint again until December 2020, because she was waiting for a response from her daughter’s school. As outlined above, Dr L confirmed she was fully aware of her need to complain in July 2019. It is reasonable to say Dr L could have submitted a complaint to the Trust separately at an earlier opportunity. The complaints process with the school would not have prevented the Trust doing an investigation of her daughter’s medical assessment. We do not consider this is a strong reason to set the time limit to one side.

20. The Trust closed this complaint on 29 July 2021. Dr L did not submit her complaint to us until November 2021, approximately 4 months later. The Trust’s letter dated May 2021 shows she was signposted to us. Dr L did not provide us with any explanation for this further delay. As such, it appears she could have approached us earlier, given that she was aware of our service and our time limits. Having considered the evidence, we have not seen good reasons to account for these delays. For this reason, we have decided not to set the time limit to one side and will not be taking any further action on her complaint

21. We thank Dr L for taking the time to tell us about her complaint. We were sorry to hear about the upset caused to her and her daughter.

1. We have carefully considered Dr L’s complaint about Cambridgeshire Community Services NHS Trust (the Trust). We appreciate Dr L has experienced upset and frustration following her daughter’s assessment and treatment. We are sorry to learn of her experiences.

2. We have considered the information Dr L has provided and decided the complaint falls outside of our time limit. We have considered the circumstances and the explanations Dr L has given. We have not seen strong reasons to put our time limit to one side.