Trust board meetings and papers

Public trust board meetings 2020-21
Date	Time	Venue
7 November 2021	9.30am - 12.00pm	Join Zoom meeting here
How can I observe the Trust Board meeting? You can join in live by clicking on the Zoom meeting link: https://westherts-nhs-net.zoom.us/j/94749547381 If you are accessing the link on a computer you will be prompted to download Zoom when you click the link. You can however choose to 'join from your browser’ which allows you to join without having to download anything. You can also join on your phone or tablet - you can download the Zoom app from the app store or as mentioned 'join from your browser' without downloading. How can I ask a question? You can ask a question during the live event using the chat function; questions will be taken at the end of the meeting. To make sure your question is seen, please send your question to the user West Herts Trust which should be the default choice. If you send it to any of the other hosts, they may not see it. Please note, we may not be able to answer all questions at the meeting depending on the number received.

The trust board is the ultimate decision making unit for West Hertfordshire Hospitals NHS Trust. It is responsible for setting the strategic direction of the organisation and ensuring that financial targets are achieved.

Membership of the board includes the Chairman, Chief Executive, Executive Directors and Non-Executive Directors.

Meet the board

The board holds a monthly board meeting in public where it receives information and assurance on performance. The board meetings often begin with a short presentation from a member of staff or a ‘patient story’. Matters of strategic importance are discussed and decisions are taken.

Matters that have a highly sensitive nature or are ‘commercial in confidence’ are held in part 2. This is held in private. The board seeks to make as much of its business as possible open to the public and so the vast majority of papers and discussions fall within part 1, i.e. held in public.

Members of the public have an open invitation to attend part 1 and to ask questions at the point in the agenda set aside for this. Board papers are made available and these include minutes and a decision log.

In order to help the board answer complex questions, we ask that these are submitted in advance to Barbara Anthony, Trust Secretary, or by telephone 01923 436361.

COVID-19 update

COVID-19 has had and is still having a significant impact on the trust. The absolute priority in March, April and May was to ensure the trust’s sickest patients were being cared for and that the trust was playing its full part in addressing the outbreak.

The agendas of the board meetings in these months were reduced and the length of the meetings was shortened. The meetings are usually held at Watford General Hospital, where there has been a ‘no visitor’ rule since early April. We considered moving the board meeting to another site but attendees were required to remain on-site at Watford as part of our response to the outbreak. Although there was no facility for the public to join the slimmed down board meetings, we continued to invite questions from the public. For our June Board meeting we invited Healthwatch Hertfordshire to observe the meeting and to raise any questions they had during the course of the meeting.