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Katherine Murphy, Chief Executive of the Patients Association responded to the CQC report on the state of care.

“The NHS needs at its heart safety, compassion and dignity. It is encouraging that the report suggests that there is more good than bad in our health service, however it is worrying to see that there is still such variation in the quality of care being delivered. This cannot continue. 

Most worrying is the problem of safety across the NHS, with over one in ten hospitals rated as inadequate for safety. The safety of patients should be the primary concern of all healthcare professionals and good quality healthcare is the right of all NHS users. The CQC highlights concerns that we regularly receive calls about on our Helpline, namely that there is a failure to investigate complaints properly and to ensure that these incidents do not happen again. For change to occur this must be the focus of all NHS services going forward. 

It is very worrying the report states that many Trusts do not have the right quality of staff. The Patients Association have said on many occasions that it is a right for individual patients to be treated by skilled staff with expertise and those who have patient safety as their guiding principle. It is also noticeable that the high achieved Trusts and those that succeed work in collaboration with others, involve and engage their most valuable asset – their staff. They listen and they work in partnership.

Whilst we acknowledge that the NHS is undoubtedly going through on of the most challenging times in its history, this does not mean that it should not deliver on the fundamentals of care. It is worrying to see the same failures in patient safety in the NHS, and this is why the Patients Association created the All Party Parliamentary Group on Patient Safety. We will continue to use this group in order to help spread good practice across the NHS and encourage them to listen and work with patients and members of the public.” 

View report: http://www.cqc.org.uk/sites/default/files/state-of-care-201314-full-report-1.1.pdf

Notes for Editors

The Patients Association is an independent national health and social care charity established over 52 years ago, and has a long history of campaigning to ensure that the voice of patients is heard within the Health and Social care system.

For further information please contact the Patients Association on 020 8423 9111 alternatively you can call 07779 004898.

You can also visit us on our website at www.patients-association.org.uk

You can also view our All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Patient Safety at http://www.patientsassociation.org.uk/policy-campaigns/all-party-parliamentary-group-patient-safety/