Greater Manchester's troubled mental health provider appoints new chief executive

Greater Manchester's troubled mental health trust has appointed a new chief executive in the wake of years of back-to-back failings to patients and their families.

In September 2022, shocking findings were revealed about Greater Manchester Mental Health Trust (GMMH) in a BBC Panorama documentary, showing patients being abused by staff in the trust’s Edenfield Centre, an inpatient mental health facility on the site of the former Prestwich Hospital. Before that episode aired, the Manchester Evening News had already been reporting on the unsafe understaffing of those mental health services, and how trust failures had been cited in court as contributing to the tragic deaths of multiple people supposed to be under its care.

GMMH has spent two years being slammed by health watchdogs - the Care Quality Commission (CQC) - and has been the subject of numerous investigations by the Good Governance Institute, NHS England, and Greater Manchester Police.

READ MORE Two teenagers arrested on suspicion of attempted murder after boy, 16, stabbed

After months of difficult searching for a leader by the trust, a new chief executive has been appointed, the M.E.N. understands.

Karen Howell OBE will join GMMH in June 2024, from Wirral Community Health & Care NHS Foundation Trust, following a career spanning almost 45 years in the NHS, GMMH confirmed this week. 'Karen is a registered nurse and was awarded an OBE in 2023 for services to health care, having made major contributions to the NHS, including leading large and complex organisations across acute, secondary, community mental health and primary care services', said the trust.

Last month, the findings of an NHS review by Professor Oliver Shanley into the care and treatment provided by