Reports on NHS complaints handling
Is anyone listening? a report on complaints handling in the NHS
We receive around 8,000 requests a year to review second stage complaints, but just under a third of these need to be referred back to trusts for further investigation. This shows that many trusts are not dealing with complaints effectively. To find out why, we carried out the first ever audit of how NHS trusts in England handle complaints from patients and their representatives.
The audit was carried out during February and March 2007, and looked at performance across all types of healthcare organisations in the NHS, including acute, mental health, ambulance and primary care trusts. The audit focused on trusts’ systems for handling complaints, not on individual cases, and highlighted a number of areas where trusts need to improve their performance.
More about our audit of NHS complaints handling
Spotlight on complaints
Since we took on the role of independent reviewer in 2004, far more complaints have been referred to us for independent review than were referred for appeal under the previous system. We have received around 8,000 requests per year, compared with around 3,200 per year.
"Spotlight on complaints" is the first report of our work reviewing complaints made by patients or their representatives. It covers the first 16,000 requests for independent review that we received between July 2004 and July 2006 and highlights recurring themes and lessons learnt.
The second "Spotlight on Complaints" report was published on 7 April 2008, and covers more than 10,000 complaints that were independently reviewed by the Healthcare Commission between August 2006 and July 2007.
Spotlight on complaints report - July 2004 to July 2006 (pdf 1476kb) (opens new window)
Spotlight on complaints report - August 2006 to July 2007 (pdf 784kb) (opens new window)
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