OKEHAMPTON Community Hospital is one of the cleanest in the country ? and that?s official. In a recent assessment, the community hospital?s cleanliness was judged ?excellent?, along with just four other community hospitals in Devon ? Ashburton, Newton Abbot, Ottery St Mary, and Tiverton. Okehampton was also ranked as ?excellent? for its food, and for the privacy and dignity which it affords to patients, making it one of only five community hospitals in Devon to score top ratings across the board. The awards are made by the Pension Environment Action Team which is run by the NHS?s national patents safety agency. Modern matron at Okehampton Hospital, Margaret Hamer, said, ?I?d like to say that I wasn?t surprised when I saw the results but even I had to look twice when I saw ?excellent? in every category. Patients are always telling us how great they think the hospital is. Now it?s official.? Chairman of the Friends of Okehampton Hospital Martin Perry said the support group was also delighted to hear the results. ?These results, along with those for the Royal Devon and Exeter Hospital, mean that we are really fortunate in this area in having a community hospital and an acute care hospital that are both well above the national average, and leaders in the field of cleanliness and hygiene,? he said. ?It?s a wonderful result and clearly demonstrates how hard our team works to get things right.? There was also more good news for the hospital this week with the announcement that three new midwives are to join its maternity unit this August. The new appointments follow on the back of a phenomenal increase in the number of births at the hospital ? which have now doubled to an average of 12 every month. Mr Perry said: ?This means that the maternity unit is now much more secure than it was just three months ago.?