Hospital patients are so confused by NHS
complaints procedures that many do not bother to speak out at all, a report
warns today.
Thousands are put
off lodging a formal grievance by baffling systems or concerns that their
gripes will lead to reprisals against a loved one, say watchdogs.
A review by the Care
Quality Commission (CQC) also pointed to poor complaint handling, slow
investigations and patients not being taken seriously as key areas of concern
in hospitals.
It said complainants were met ‘too often’
with a defensive culture rather than one that listens and is willing to learn.
But it is also
worried about ‘very few’ complaints over adult social care and primary care,
which could indicate the lack of an open culture in which concerns are
welcomed.
Professor Sir Mike
Richards, chief inspector of hospitals at the CQC, said: ‘A service that is
safe, responsive and well-led will treat every concern as an opportunity to
improve, will encourage its staff to raise concerns without fear of reprisal,
and will respond to complaints openly and honestly
‘Unfortunately this is not happening
everywhere. While most providers have complaints systems in place, people’s
experiences of these are not consistently good.
‘We know from the
thousands of people who contact the CQC every year that many people do not even
get as far as making a complaint as they are put off by the confusing system or
worried about the impact that complaining might have on their or their loved
one’s care.
‘More needs to be
done to encourage an open culture where concerns are welcomed and learned
from.’
The CQC received
more than 18,000 complaints about poor care last year – 50 a day – while
written complaints about the NHS to the Health and Social Care Information
Centre topped 75,000. Healthwatch
The Patients Association last month found
half of complaints were not handled well and warned the culture of secrecy in
the NHS has barely changed since the Mid Staffordshire hospital scandal, in
which hundreds of patients died due to neglect.
Health Secretary
Jeremy Hunt said: ‘One of the biggest lessons of the tragedy at Mid Staffs is
the need to listen and act on all complaints.
‘So as part of our
drive to confront poor care we’re making sure people know how to complain and
transforming complaints handling – now a crucial part of the CQC’s tough, independent inspection regime.’
The CQC’s inspection teams are now being told to take
complaints handling into account during inspections in
The latest report
follows a review of the NHS complaints system last November by health experts
and Ann Clwyd, the Labour MP who broke down in the Commons as she described how
her husband died in hospital ‘like a battery hen’.
Welcoming the
report, she said: ‘I want the many thousands of people who wrote to me in the
course of my review to know that change is expected as a result.’
Richard
Lloyd of Which? said: ‘For too
long the views of health and social care users have not been heard, so it’s
good the regulator is taking steps to improve complaints handling and put
patient feedback at the heart of what it does.
‘We now need greater
detail on how complaints will trigger action from the regulator, to give people
confidence it’s worthwhile speaking up and that something can, and will, be
done.’