22.09.15
Non-medical care accounts for almost half of complaints – Ombudsman
Errors in diagnosis and poor communication and treatment were the top three reasons for hospital complaints investigated by the health service ombudsman in 2014-15, their report has shown.
Poor communication, including quality and accuracy of information, figured in one-third of all complaints. Other motivations behind complaints scoped staff attitude and behaviour, which factored into two out of 10 complaints.
The report therefore concluded that non-medical aspects of patient care were present in almost half of all complaints looked into by the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman, Julie Mellor, who said: “I strongly believe that NHS leaders should welcome feedback from patients and recognise the opportunities that good complaint handling offers to improve the services they provide.
“We are publishing this data to help hospital trusts identify problems and take action to ensure trust in the healthcare system remains high.”
Research also revealed that the number of enquiries received and investigated about acute trusts increased compared to 2013-14.
Concerning the NHS, complaints rose by nearly 2,500 to a total of 21,371. Of these, almost 9,000 were about acute trusts.
The ombudsman also completed almost the double of investigations about acute trusts in 2014-15 compared to the previous year, but this can be largely explained by changes to the way it handles complaints to take on more investigations.
The research looks into unresolved complaints for every acute trust, comparing the number of complaints investigated to the size of each trust. The size of the trust is calculated by the number of ‘clinical incidents’ it carries out, such as outpatient appointments, elective surgery and emergency admissions.
The ombudsman makes final decisions on complaints which haven’t been resolved locally by NHS England.