02.08.11
Watch me watch you
Leading healthcare and patient charities think the NHS needs to be more accountable to the public.
They are probably right that the proposed HealthWatch bodies are too weak to give patients a real voice – and the Local Improvement Networks were doing a pretty good job of saving money, although admittedly a slightly less good job of representing patients. The LINs are to disappear, probably because they were so clearly a Labour innovation.
There is confusion, too over the exact role of HealthWatch bodies – are they primarily exercising a representative function, or a regulatory function?
Squaring this circle will be an impressive achievement – accountability to patients in the NHS has been the subject of permanent revolution for years now.
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