The chief executive of a troubled NHS trust has quit over “media attention”.
Katrina Percy said “the effect ongoing personal media attention has had on staff and patients” had made her position at Southern Health NHS Foundation Trust untenable.
Ms Percy had faced calls to quit after the trust was criticised over the way it investigated patient deaths.
An NHS England-commissioned probe found 272 of the 722 deaths over the last four years were dealt with properly.
Ms Percy, who was chief executive for nine years, said she “firmly believed” it was her responsibility to stay on to “oversee improvements” and was taking on a new role providing “strategic advice to local GP leaders”.
But she added she understood why “many will say I should have stepped down sooner given the very public concerns which have been raised in the past months”.
A spokeswoman for the trust said Ms Percy’s salary – which is quoted in the trust’s annual report as between £180,000 and £190,000 – will remain the same when she moves to the advisory role.
In June, Southern Health accepted responsibility for the death of 18-year-old Connor Sparrowhawk, who drowned in a bath at one of its facilities – Slade House in Oxford.
The trust admitted it caused the death of Connor, who had suffered an epileptic seizure before he died in July 2013, and offered his family £80,000 compensation.
Southern Health NHS Foundation Trust covers Hampshire, Dorset, Wiltshire, Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire.