Yeovil District Hos-pital maintained its overall standards last year (2001-02) compared to the previous year.

Department of Health performance indicators have been released and show that the hospital retains its two-star rating.

In short, a large number of areas - such as waiting times and readmission after discharge rates, for example - are monitored and added up to decide what performance bracket each hospital trust ends up in.

The rating system goes from no star at all to three stars, with the East Somerset NHS Trust (based at Yeovil District Hospital) winning two stars - just like the previous year.

A total of 304 trusts were measured - 68 of them getting three stars, 172 getting two stars, 54 getting one star and 10 failing to win a star at all.

Statistics from Yeovil reveal, for example, that: 100% of women were seen for breast cancer treatment within one month; a significantly lower than average rate of emergency re-admissions (within 28 days of discharge) had been achieved.

On the down side, it was revealed that 87.2% of patients with suspected cancer were seen within two weeks after having been referred to the hospital - the government target is 100%.

Patient deaths within 30 days of surgery after emergency admission were higher than the average, but trust bosses have presented potential reasons for this.

One is the fact that the trust is compared with trusts that don't have community hospitals.

Patients who have died in these hospitals were this year included in statistics for East Somerset NHS Trust while such cases in other areas were attributed to the primary care trusts, which now run community hospitals.

Commenting on the two-star rating, East Somerset NHS Trust boss James Scott said: "We support the publication of comparative information which helps people understand how their local health service is performing.

"The healthy position of this trust is due to the dedication of our staff and they deserve our sincere thanks for this effort.

"It is the intention of this trust to achieve the three-star status and we will continue to work hard this year to achieve that goal."