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Clinical Negligence Solicitors

Hospitals to provide more information for private healthcare patients (8 September 2016)

Date: 08/09/2016
Duncan Lewis, Clinical Negligence Solicitors, Hospitals to provide more information for private healthcare patients

The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has said that hospitals must help provide better information for private patients.

Following its investigation into the private healthcare market published in 2014, the CMA found there was a lack of publicly available information on performance and fees, to enable patients to compare services and make informed choices about their treatment.

In December 2014, the CMA appointed the Private Healthcare Information Network (PHIN) to make available information on the performance of hospitals and consultants via an independent public website.

More than 500 hospitals which treat patients privately – both independent hospitals and NHS private units – were required from 1 September to submit the relevant data to enable PHIN to publish specified performance measures from 30 April 2017.

The measures will include mortality and infection rates, the number of patients re-admitted to hospital or transferred to an NHS hospital following surgery – as well as measures of patient satisfaction and health improvement following treatment.

PHIN’s website will also in the future carry information on consultants’ fees, so that patients considering private treatment will be able to compare hospitals and consultants on a range of quality measures – as well as comparing fees.

PHIN anticipates that most larger providers of private healthcare – representing around 80% of private treatment across the UK – are going to meet the requirement; however, the CMA is reminding those which do not that they are required to do so by a legally binding Order.

Chairman of the CMA’s private healthcare investigation, Roger Witcomb, said:

“This data will help provide essential information on performance and quality which patients are entitled to expect.

“While we’re pleased that the response from private healthcare providers has been largely positive, we’d remind those lagging behind that this is a legal requirement and – along with PHIN – we will be following up to ensure compliance with the requirements.

“Greater information on the performance of hospital operators and consultants – and later on, consultants’ fees – will help patients to be more active in making the right choice for them of where and by whom to be treated.

“This will help drive care providers to compete on the things that matter to patients.”

Matt James from PHIN added:

“The CMA’s requirements essentially bring private healthcare into line with NHS information processes, to enable fair comparison.

“Hospitals have faced a huge task to implement new data collection processes – and, in general, the response has been very positive and deserves recognition.

“Some organisations have not yet responded – and no hospital’s data will be perfect – so we will work with both hospitals and the CMA to improve completeness in the coming months.”

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