Health and Adult social care must embrace complaints to improve services
Published: 8 Dec 2014
In a report out today the Care Quality Commission has found that there is wide variation in the way complaints are handled across the NHS, primary care and adult social care services in England, with complainants being met too often with a defensive culture rather than one that listens and is willing to learn.
Peter Walsh, Chief Executive of the patient safety charity Action against Medical Accidents said: “This report is yet another stark reminder of how inconsistent and often unsatisfactory complaint handling in the NHS still is. Progress on improving NHS complaints is painfully slow in spite of the Francis and Clwyd/Hart reports. On the positive side, at least the CQC recognises how important complaints are and is going to be taking a close look at how complaints are being dealt with in their inspections. We are glad to report that since we have been working with CQC on the “Tell us about your care” project, we have been able to furnish CQC with hundreds of examples of poor care reported to our helpline, and this information is also being used to inform their inspection and regulation of healthcare.”