Patients to give ‘rating’ to NHS treatment
A new test launched today will allow patients to rate their NHS hospital’s care and treatment, and the results will hold hospital leaders to account.
The ‘family and friends’ test will ask whether patients would recommend their hospital to loved ones and will be rolled out across wards from April 2013.
The results will be published and leaders of hospitals who fail to get good feedback will be held to account.
It was recommended to David Cameron by the Nursing and Care Quality Forum, which was set up in January to address concerns about the way some patients are treated in hospital.
In a letter to the prime minister, the Nursing and Care Quality Forum said it was critical that the NHS take greater notice of what people think about the quality of care they receive: “An important way of doing this is asking people whether they would recommend the organisation where they have received care, should a loved one require treatment.”
The forum made a number of recommendations to improve care in its first report, including increasing nurses staffing levels which have dropped over the last year, but this is the first that the prime minister has approved.
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Hospitals forced to ‘raise their game’
Mr Cameron will announce the test later on Friday and has said that the data will give patients a clear idea of where to get the best care.
“To really make sure that patients get the right care, we’re moving ahead quickly on one of their (Nursing Care and Quality Forum’s) main recommendations – the friends and family test,” he said.
“By making those answers public we’re going to give everyone a really clear idea of where to get the best care – and drive other hospitals to raise their game.”
Giving nurses the time and resources to care – for example freeing them up to guarantee that they spend dedicated time with their patients and get the right administrative support – is crucial in ensuring confidence in care providers. Peter Carter, RCN
The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) welcomed the new test and said it would be an important gauge of how people perceive the care they are provided by their organisation.
“Giving nurses the time and resources to care – for example freeing them up to guarantee that they spend dedicated time with their patients and get the right administrative support – is crucial in ensuring confidence in care providers,” said RCN chief executive and general secretary Dr Peter Carter.
The forum also recommended that nurses are recruited for their caring nature and compassion as well as their knowledge and skills and Mr Carter said he agreed with its suggestions.
“Patient need is increasingly complex and requires staff with both academic knowledge and values of compassion, empathy and dignity,” he said. “We support the idea that all these elements can be tested at an individual level.”
‘Headline-grabbing’ announcement
Shadow health secretary Andy Burnham said that today’s announcement was no substitute for “getting a grip on what matters” to patients.
“David Cameron now wants to hear the views of patients but it’s a shame he wouldn’t listen to them when they were pleading with him in their thousands to drop his bitterly contested NHS reorganisation.
“On Cameron’s watch, people are waiting longer in A and E and on trolleys in corridors. Wards are closing and almost 4,000 nursing posts are being lost.
“David Cameron needs to focus a bit less on headline-grabbing announcements and a bit more on dealing with the chaos that his reorganisation has inflicted on the NHS.”