This is our first guest blog. The author is a clinical audit and quality improvement expert working for an Acute Trust. The author wishes to remain anonymous.
Trusts are required to contribute a sum towards the funding of the NCAPOP. A good investment I hear you say! But is it? As an Audit professional I struggle with the concept of there being no discernible evidence that every audit within the programme is in fact delivering any clinical benefit to our patients. I agree (without naming them) that there are some which have indisputably led to improvements in the care and outcomes of our patients and their work in this regard is to be applauded. But not everything is rosy. For those of us living and breathing Audit on the coal face, we see embattled audit staff and clinicians dragging themselves (through data burden town) towards deadlines by their fingernails because they are told that we must submit the data or risk breaching our standard contract. So we do this to keep our side of the bargain, but what do we get in return? In some instances, badly written reports, incorrect data being attributed to trusts, delays in publications, I could go on but I won’t labour the point. There appears no incentive for them to make them better. A contract is signed and away they go. In instances where we have concerns over the standard of the audit, we can’t vote with our feet like we would if we were paying for a product out on the high street.
The CQC are placing more and more emphasis (and value) on the data being collected for them on which to base their reports. This is great if the data is accurate but when it isn’t we have to invest loads of resource in correcting any errors. So we put up with it, try and make our concerns known via our local and national networks and hope that the change will come. Now this is the really interesting bit. I’m relatively new to Audit. Before I undertook my role I did some reading up. The value of audit in improving patient outcomes is not up for debate and there is lots of evidence to support this. However, the themes highlighted where they fall down have been the same for many years. Audit professionals who have taken sabbaticals for a dozen years are returning and are being afflicted by ‘EastEnders syndrome’ i.e. you can miss 4 years’ worth of episodes and when you get back to the storyline it’s still the same.
So why is the feedback being presented not landing or more pertinently in the current political climate, are the views of the many being ignored to satisfy the will of those in power??? Who are they accountable too and are they providing a good service???
So how do we make our voices heard? Do we simply stop inputting data in protest?? No because it would be our patients who suffer, and let’s not forget it‘s their money that is being spent to fund our involvement in the NCAPOP. What we can do is raise our voices during #CAAW19 when the spotlight will be upon us to try and bring about meaningful change. It’s as a collective voice where we can be at our strongest. It’s time for us to stand together and stand up for what we believe in.