04 April 2003
Patients who are not satisfied with NHS trusts' handling of complaints will be able to ask the new Commission for Healthcare Audit and Inspection (Chai) to undertake an independent review, health minister David Lammy said this week.
In a move to overhaul the NHS complaints system in England – and potentially reduce the number of unsatisfied complainants who go on to seek clinical negligence compensation – Lammy said Chai would take responsibility for independent reviews of complaints.
At the moment, trusts handle their own complaints procedure. Most are resolved by the trust through written and verbal explanations and apologies.
Around 2% of complainants take their disputes further and demand an independent review. But these are carried out by the trusts and patients feel these reviews are anything but independent, so they will be given to Chai, which is due to begin work in April next year.
The health minister said that he would set up patient feedback and customer care training for NHS staff, including board members, to help resolve complaints quickly.
'Our radical plans will mean that individual patients will get full responses to their complaints and that the lessons learned from them will lead directly to service improvement,' he added.
Peter Walsh, chief executive of pressure group Action for Victims of Medical Accidents, said the changes were needed. He said: 'We welcome the move to a genuinely independent review stage of the complaints procedure – something we have long campaigned for – and the emphasis given to learning the lessons from complaints.'
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