06.03.13
MPs criticise NMC over case backlog and inadequate IT
The Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) has “fallen down” on the task of enforcing acceptable standards of practice in staff, a new report by the Health Select Committee warns.
While the NMC does provide a “vital safeguard” for care quality and patient safety, the committee has criticised the regulator for chronic underinvestment, poor language and communication skills, slow progress on revalidation and “inadequate” IT infrastructure.
The MPs want the average time taking to decide a fitness to practise reduced from 18 months to nine, with the maximum time set at 12. The NMC still faces a huge backlog of cases and needs to address this with “greater urgency”, the report states.
The NMC also has “a poor track record” of fitness to practise decisions being challenged and overturned and the committee warned that the quality of these decisions is just as important as the timescale.
Committee chair Stephen Dorrell MP said: “The NMC’s job is to protect patient safety by registering nurses and midwives and by enforcing acceptable standards of practice. The simple fact is that in recent years it has fallen down on that task.
“The Committee notes that many of the NMC’s problems (connected with fitness to practise, the projected cost of future workload and how to target high risk groups for revalidation) stem from inadequate IT infrastructure where two key systems cannot communicate directly and deliver incomplete or inaccurate information.
“If the NMC’s IT systems are inadequate, then the NMC cannot fulfil its regulatory role. The NMC must take urgent action now to resolve this problem and will be expected to provide concrete evidence of properly functioning IT at its next annual accountability hearing.”
NMC chief executive Jackie Smith welcomed the report and said: “In particular we agree with the committee that our focus must be public protection. We don't under-estimate the challenges ahead.
“If our legislation was changed we could handle Fitness to Practise cases more rapidly, more consistently, and more economically. We welcomed the Prime Minister’s commitment to support this, a positive development following the Francis report.
“The report is not a clean bill of health, and we don’t expect that. As an organisation, we know we have a lot to do before we become an efficient and effective regulator. We are now focused on our core statutory role, tackling our Fitness to Practise workload, introducing revalidation, and reviewing our systems and processes, all to protect the public.”
Dr Peter Carter, chief executive & general secretary of the RCN said the NMC needs to “forge ahead” in reducing the backlog of cases and to develop revalidation as a priority.
He said: “To do this, the NMC needs to have continuity in its leadership, and importantly it must be financially stable. Nurses need to have faith and confidence in their regulator, and this will be damaged if they are again confronted with an unfair increase in registration fees designed to bail out an organisation which has not been able to plan its workload.”
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