A recent study found that Dumfries and Galloway Royal Infirmary staff frequently use rooms intended for one patient to accommodate two people.
Inspectors voiced concerns about patient privacy and risk assessments in single-occupancy rooms.
During their impromptu visit on March 20–22, they claimed that the hospital was operating at or near full capacity.
Despite the volume of activity, the majority of the spaces were calm, and interactions between the patients, staff, and relatives were positive.
Senior managers and staff teamwork in providing care were praised in the Healthcare Improvement Scotland report.
All single rooms make up the 344-bed Dumfries hospital, which cost £212 million and opened in 2017.
Critics warned that long-term patients might become isolated, despite NHS officials' promises to reduce cross-infection and protect patients' privacy and dignity at the time. .
When two patients occupied single occupancy rooms, some of them, according to inspectors, lacked privacy screens.
The report noted that in one ward without a screen, "we observed a patient being moved temporarily into the corridor by staff to allow the other patient privacy.".
The inspectors were later informed by senior managers that more screens had been ordered.
The risk assessment done on patients waiting to share a single occupancy room also caused concern from inspectors.
They discovered numerous variants of the risk assessment, each with different requirements for the patients who might be taken into account.
The patients they spoke with gave their consent to sharing a single-occupancy room, but the risk assessment did not ask about consent.
Nevertheless, they also discovered that the extra beds "did not appear to have a negative impact on patient safety.".
They continued, "For instance, incidents reported did not highlight any apparent increase in patient falls for patients residing within these beds.
Two of the seven demands made by the inspectors related to the extra patients in the single-occupancy rooms.
In addition, they outlined five instances of best practices and made one recommendation.
Healthcare Improvement Scotland's chief inspector, Donna Maclean, stated that "a significant range of pressures" had been present at the hospital and throughout much of the NHS Scotland at the time of the inspection.
These included an increase in enrollment and a decrease in staff availability.
However, she added, "despite the hospital being busy, the majority of areas were calm and well-organized, and we saw positive, respectful interactions between staff, patients, and family members with good teamwork to support the safe delivery of care.".
Senior managers demonstrated effective control over and comprehension of their clinical domains. ".
She continued by saying that the visitor and patient facilities had been of the highest caliber.
A response has been requested from NHS Dumfries and Galloway.
