By Vivienne Russell | 16 September 2011
Waiting times for people needing inpatient hospital treatment in England have increased after a long period of stability, the Care Quality Commission said yesterday.
In its third annual report on the stateof health and social care in England, the CQC also raised concerns about access to social care. It said demand for services was continuing to rise while budgets are shrinking, resulting in many local authorities tightening their eligibility criteria.
Other findings include a rise in the number of people using direct payments or personal budgets to fund their social care and improvements in patients’ perceptions of hospital cleanliness. The watchdog also found high levels of satisfaction with community mental health services, with 80% of survey respondents rating their service as either ‘good’, ‘very good’ or ‘excellent’.
CQC chair Dame Jo Williams said all health and social care providers were now registered with the CQC. ‘While it will be a further year before we can present a complete picture of the state of regulated care in England, this year’s report provides a valuable picture of people’s experiences of access to care services, the choice and control that they have when using services, and the quality of the care that is provided.’
She added that she hoped commissioners and providers would use the information in the report to improve their services.
Commenting on the CQC’s findings, Jo Webber, deputy director of policy at the NHS Confederation, said: ‘The CQC highlights the growing tension among NHS trusts to keep waiting times low in the face of rising financial constraints. We know NHS leaders will have to make some difficult decisions about how care is planned and delivered if we are to avoid a deterioration in the standard of services and patient access to care.
‘This challenge is made ever greater by the fact that the NHS is being asked to produce £20bn in savings at the same time it is going through the biggest structural reorganisation it has ever experienced.’
