PATIENTS recovering from NHS hospital treatment will not be transferred into a private nursing home until an investigation into its safety is completed.

Health officials put the sanction against Hilltop Manor in place after the Chell home admitted shortcomings in the care of an 81-year-old women in the lead-up to her death.

Hilltop Manor is one of a number of homes paid by Stoke-on-Trent Primary Care Trust (PCT) to take patients as the trust looks to free-up beds at the University Hospital of North Staffordshire (UHNS).

But the 80-bed home in High Lane became the focus of complaints from the family of great-grandmother Elsie Bradley after she was discharged there eight days after a hip operation.

The pensioner, of Barber Road, Chell, below, spent eight weeks at the home before returning to the hospital as her health deteriorated. She died three weeks later in July 2008.

An inquest has previously heard about "poor" standards at the home.

And now the PCT, which had already announced it was to was to review its contract with Hilltop Manor, has confirmed it will not send patients to the home until a probe is completed.

A trust spokesman said: "Patient safety is top of our list of priorities, therefore the PCT has suspended admissions to Hilltop Manor care home while an investigation is carried out."

Mrs Bradley's daughter Linda Forrester, from Burslem, welcomed the measure. But she said she feared it was symptomatic of wider problem facing NHS patients being referred to private nursing homes.

Such transfers have only been needed in the past few years after hundreds of long-stay beds in North Staffordshire elderly care hospitals were axed amid furious protests.

Mrs Bradley's relatives complained to the health services ombudsman that she caught an infection at the home.

But they dropped the action last month when Hilltop Manor's owners said sorry and pledged efforts had been made to address the problems.

National care services regulator the Care Quality Commission is also involved in the review.

Last year, its unannounced inspection found the home could not guarantee patient safety and led to its previous three-star rating being downgraded to one.

But since the complaint first came to light The Sentinel has published a number of letters from patients' relatives praising care at the home.

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