Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the safe nursing to patient ratios are for each high dependency unit in each high-security psychiatric hospital; and on how many occasions such ratios have been breached at each hospital in each of the last three years.

Safe nursing to patient ratios in each high dependency unit within the high-security hospitals are determined by the hospitals themselves.

To determine the safe nursing to patient ratios required, the hospitals will take into consideration the number of patients on each individual ward, the acuity and dependency of the patients and known security risk factors associated with each patient.

As there is no prescribed safe nursing to patient ratio, there is no way to quantify a “breach”. Data on nursing to patient ratios in high dependency units in high-security hospitals is not collected centrally by NHS England or the Care Quality Commission.