Calls to improve complaints handling

Public satisfaction with the National Health Service has risen to its second highest level ever, according to British Social Attitudes survey data for 2014 published by The King’s Fund.¹ The latest results show that satisfaction has risen from 60% to 65% in 2014, while dissatisfaction fell to an all-time low of 15%. Despite these promising figures, however, the Ombudsman Service received 8,178 enquiries about acute Trusts in 2013-14, and accepted 1,637 complaints for investigation.

The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman is the final stage in the complaints process after people have complained to the NHS. Recent figures show that nearly half (44%) of the complaints investigated by the Ombudsman are upheld. The top three reasons for hospital complaints investigated by the service are reported to be: poor communication, errors in diagnosis – including delays in diagnosis, misdiagnosis and failure to diagnose – and poor treatment. Other reasons for complaints include staff attitude, no apology when things go wrong and unnecessary delay in treatment.

For the first time, in November 2014, the Ombudsman Service published the number of enquiries and complaints it investigated for each of England’s hospital Trusts, alongside the number of written complaints the Trust received locally, published by the Health and Social Care Information Centre. This showed the number of complaints not resolved locally by the Trust, which then went onto to be investigated by the Ombudsman Service.² The report showed that some Trusts are 15 times more likely to have a complaint about them investigated by the Ombudsman Service.