For the first time, private hospitals in England will have independent inspections where hotel style ratings will be made public, so helping domestic and international patients in making choices.
The independent Care Quality Commission is running a pilot to test a new inspection approach. Eight independent hospitals will be inspected around the country. These vary in size and in the number and type of services they provide, including both NHS-funded care and solely private care.
The first new style inspections will allow it to test out the new model in different independent hospital settings. CQC will expect to receive equivalent information about performance to that it receives from NHS hospitals.
CQC’s new regulatory approach for the independent healthcare sector signals the first time that these providers will be awarded ratings (from April 2015). There will also be a significant increase in access to information that will help people who use the services to make decisions about their care.
The first inspections will take place from October to December 2014. They will include announced and unannounced elements and may include inspections in the evenings and weekends when CQC suspects people can experience poor care. These pilots will help it refine the way it inspects this sector and help it develop a rating system. It will begin to issue ratings for private hospitals in 2015.
The core services being inspected will follow the same approach as in the NHS to include: surgery; including cosmetic surgery, urgent care services, medical care, children and young people’s care and outpatients.
The eight pilot hospitals are:• Baddow Hospital, Essex• BMI Mount Alvernia, Surrey• The Lister Hospital, London• The London Welbeck Hospital, London• Nuffield Health Tees Hospital, County Durham• Oaklands Hospital, Salford• Peninsula NHS Treatment Centre, Devon• Spire Southampton Hospital, Hampshire
Professor Sir Mike Richards, chief inspector of hospitals, says: “We need to hold the independent sector to the same standard as the NHS.As we have seen in the NHS, these new-style inspections will allow us to get under the skin of the organisation to give us a much more detailed picture of independent hospital care in England than ever before. We are significantly increasing public access to information on independent healthcare, which is good news for people who use services, as it will help people to make informed decisions about their care.”
Each inspection seeks to answer five questions about services: are they safe, caring, effective, well led and responsive to people’s needs?
All independent healthcare providers will receive full ratings from April 2015. The ratings are: outstanding, good, requires improvement and inadequate.Where there are failures in care, the inspection team will highlight what needs to be addressed and the hospitals must put in place a clear programme to deal with any problems quickly.
The independent sector covers large hospitals that operate under a single corporation with multiple locations to single specialties (for example, cosmetic surgery clinics or dialysis centres) and individuals delivering single speciality services.
There are 276 independent acute hospitals and 47 independent treatment centres registered with CQC.
The inspections will be at individual hospital level. CQC is developing its approach to inspecting at corporate headquarters level for large corporate providers that own many hospitals and/or clinics.