Commission launches era of light touch service reviews

18 Aug 05
The Healthcare Commission began its new era of 'light touch' assessment this week, launching major

19 August 2005

The Healthcare Commission began its new era of 'light touch' assessment this week, launching major reviews of services for children, substance abusers and smokers.

The improvement reviews replace the week-long clinical governance assessments carried out on all trusts in England once every three years. Instead, the commission will mostly use information that is already collected routinely.

The reviews will assess the efficacy of primary care trusts' smoking cessation services and local drug action teams. Hospitals will also be asked whether they tailor services to children and have appropriately qualified staff.

The commission will use the results as part of its annual health check performance rating. Only poorly performing trusts will receive a visit from commission inspectors, who will devise action plans.

Commission chief executive Anna Walker said the topics were chosen to mirror patients' concerns and because they had the potential to make great improvements to the nation's health. There was concern over children's services following a number of scandals, while smoking was the single biggest cause of preventable illness and premature death.

Smoking-related disease killed more than 106,000 people each year, and an estimated 287,000 problem drug users would also benefit from improved services.

'Improvement reviews take an in-depth look at an area of national priority in a targeted and proportionate way,' said Walker. 'These reviews will help bring about real improvements to the nation's health.'

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