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Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust

Answer

The primary care trust (PCT) monitors performance and scrutinises complaints through the Commissioning Quality Review Committee meetings. The complaints report is presented at the PCTs Quality Scrutiny Committee, which looks at the response rates, key themes and any trends. This is then reported through the Governance Group meetings at the PCT. The PCT reports complaints at its monthly trust board as part of the performance report. As a result of the situation in Mid Staffordshire, the PCT offered to advocate on behalf of patients and will continue to offer this service.More generally, the Department has reformed and strengthened the national health service complaints system from 1 April this year. This sets the expectation that hospitals need to do better at resolving complaints at the local level and, importantly, take appropriate action in the light of the outcome of a complaint.Information on complaints is already available from the Care Quality Commission, the ombudsman and the Information Centre, but we will now require hospitals to publish annually the number of complaints they receive, and how many were successfully resolved locally. We will also discuss with the health ombudsman publishing the number of complaints from each trust referred to and upheld by her. All this information will also be placed on the NHS Choices website allowing easier comparisons between hospitals.A written ministerial statement was issued on 30 April 2009 setting out the Government response to the reports on care at Mid-Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust submitted by Professor Sir George Alberti and Dr. David Colin-Thome.In line with the recommendations in Dr. David Colin-Thome's report, officials will undertake an assessment of the new complaints system in due course.

Secondary information

Type

Written question

Reference

492 c1226W; 274917

Session

2008-09

Subjects

Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust

Link

View this Written question on www.publications.parliament.uk