Moves to cut the bureaucratic burden on hospitals

New moves to cut the bureaucratic burden on hospitals - freeing up more time for treating patients - were announced today by Health Minister Lord Warner.

Currently, over 30 bodies can call on NHS Trusts to inspect performance and many more can make visits. Lord Warner announced a package of measures to streamline the process.

The new measures announced today include:

• fewer, more consistent, better-prioritised recommendations from inspectorates and more co-ordinated data collection;
• joint inspections by regulatory bodies - reducing the number of visits hospitals may face;
• consideration of inspection 'holidays' for high-performing NHS Trusts; and
• schedules of visits to be published in advance - ensuring staff can plan ahead to meet inspection requirements.

Ministers asked the Healthcare Commission to develop a concordat with the main inspection, review and audit bodies and devise a programme for delivery which sets out a new approach.

Lord Warner said:

"I want to free the NHS from inspection overload. This package of measures will mean staff spend less time ticking boxes and more time treating patients. The burden often associated with these inspections - lack of co-ordination amongst different inspecting bodies, duplication of information collected and the sheer number of visits - has been a key complaint of NHS staff.

"Inspections are of course necessary in the healthcare sector. They play a key role in ensuring patient safety, delivering value for money and driving improvement. But we need smarter regulation rather than more regulation. Inspecting bodies need to plan visits together. Joint inspections will mean fewer visits and better sharing of information and instead of a plethora of minor recommendations, there need to be fewer, more consistent and better prioritised recommendations.

"There will be an inspection 'gateway' which will reduce the amount of communication with the NHS. And there'll be a new hotline for staff so that problems with overlapping inspections can be ironed out as quickly as possible.

"I welcome both the leadership of the Healthcare Commission and the vital contribution made by the concordat signatories in developing the measures I'm announcing today. All have co-operated positively in this programme."

The new arrangements will be overseen by the Healthcare Commission.

Anna Walker, Healthcare Commission chief executive, said:

"Inspections play a key role in ensuring patient safety, delivering value for money and drive improvement and we need to work together to achieve this aim. It is therefore a highly significant event that for the first time the main inspecting bodies in healthcare have agreed to work to a set of objectives which will help reduce the burden on doctors and nurses providing frontline care. The Healthcare Commission will be working with its partner bodies to implement the concordat. Our aim is to coordinate inspections and follow up action, share data as far as possible and reduce the amounts of inspection for those performing well."

1. The Inspection Concordat can be found at www.healthcarecommission.org.uk
2. The Inspection Concordat sets out what bodies providing healthcare in England can expect from the main inspecting bodies. The concordat is designed to support improvement of services for the public and to reduce unnecessary burdens on front-line staff. The development of the concordat fulfils a commitment set out in the joint Department of Health/Cabinet Office report Making a Difference: Reducing Burdens in Healthcare Inspection and Monitoring, published in July 2003. The concordat is led by the Healthcare Commission. The concordat does not affect the statutory remit of individual inspecting bodies.
3. The concordat has been developed by the inspecting bodies in conjunction with the service itself. It identifies ten objectives that are aimed at: delivering more consistent and coherent programmes of inspection; improving services for patients, clients and their carers; reducing unnecessary burdens of inspection on staff providing healthcare.
4. Ten bodies will initially sign up to the concordat. They are:
5. Healthcare Commission National Audit Office Audit Commission Commission for Social Care Inspection NHS Litigation Authority Health and Safety Executive Academy of Medical Royal Colleges NHS Estates Mental Health Act Commission Postgraduate Medical Education and Training Board.
6. There is likely to be a second wave of signatories.
7. The concordat currently applies to England, but signatories with a remit in Wales will explore with the Welsh Assembly, the Healthcare Inspectorate Wales and other partners how the principles in the concordat will be applied to inspections in the Principality.