CQC publishes urgent and emergency care pilot reports for two local areas

As part of our plans to explore how we might comment on the quality of care across a local health and care system, we have published reports today of two pilots which explore what this could look like for urgent and emergency care (UEC) based on two local areas.

The reports on the pilots focus on UEC systems in South Warwickshire and in Airedale, Wharfedale, Craven & Bradford. In each area we looked at the contribution of the services that support people with urgent and emergency care needs, including NHS 111, A&E departments, ambulance services, GP practices, GP out of hours services and care homes – and how well they worked together for the benefit of the local population.

We chose the two local areas for a number of reasons, including their very different organisation and demographic makeup; with the aim of ensuring our approach is flexible to varying systems. We worked with each area to test a new methodology for assessing services that looked at how UEC is coordinated across organisations to ensure people receive the right care at the right time.

The reports are based on a combination of our findings from fieldwork conducted with a limited sample of local services, patient case tracking and interviews and discussion groups with people who use and run services. Due to the limited sample of services involved in our pilot fieldwork, the reports do not provide a definitive picture of local performance.

The reports include a number of recommendations that are based on what we saw in the area and set out the changes we believe should be considered to facilitate and drive improvements for a more effective and efficient UEC system.

We’ve developed the reports to test how we look at systems and how we present our findings in the future in line with the commitment we have made in our 2016-21 strategy. The pilot approach is being evaluated and the learning will be used to inform our future approach to assessing and reporting on the quality of UEC and our wider strategy on integrated care, care pathways and place-based care.

Commenting on the pilot reports, CQC’s Chief inspector of General Practice, Professor Steve Field, said:

“We are already seeing the development of innovative models of urgent and emergency care, as services begin to change the way they deliver care locally in line with the ambitions set out in the Five Year Forward View and in local Sustainability and Transformation Plans.

“In light of these changes we need to develop our approach to look beyond individual providers, and see the connections between them, so that we are able to report meaningfully on health and care services in the way people experience them.

“This project is helping us do just that by allowing us to test how we can best assess the quality of urgent and emergency care for a local population across a place, as well as strengthening our regulatory approach for individual providers.”

• Read the reports