[2] It was one of 11 trusts to be placed into special measures after the Keogh Review into higher than expected mortality rates.

[6] In April 2015 the trust asked for an emergency loan from the Department of Health as it forecast an £18 million year end deficit for 2014-15.

They found "evidence of harm to patients within the outpatient services because of poor management of the follow up appointment system".

It was again put into special measures after the Care Quality Commission found that there "remained a lack of management oversight of the recurrent backlogs".

The ophthalmology service could not meet the quality standards set by NICE regarding “the frequency of recall to follow-up, as well as the tests which need to be performed every visit due to limitation of clinical capacity, technical instrumentation and training technicians”.