Who cares for the carers?

Abstract

The NHS complaints system has been overhauled again in England with the stated aim of simplifying a process driven system and to give organisations greater flexibility to respond and encourage a culture that seeks and then uses peoples experiences of care to improve quality. The complaints system that ran from 1996 to 31 March 2009 was considered too prescriptive and inflexible and not meeting the needs of the person making the complaint. Many fine words and hours of consultations have been devoted to analysing the problems with the complaints systems and the advantages of producing a new one that enables health services to listen to the patients, respond to their concerns and improve the services delivered. This patient-centred focus is the new rally cry in the modern twenty-first century NHS. Very little thought, however, appears to have been given to those against whom the complaints are invariably directed: the dentist and their teams. What will the new reforms, with one less layer of complaints management (the Healthcare Commission) do to the dynamics of complaints management? What effects on the dentist and their teams will come about as a result of the primary care trust's ability to investigate the complaint themselves if invited to do so by the patient? © 2009 Macmillan Publishers Limited. All rights reserved.