A record number of complaints were made to England’s health service ombudsman last year, many of them against health authorities that had refused to fund continuing care in nursing homes, writes Craig Kenny.
In her annual report, the ombudsman Ann Abraham said she had received 3,994 complaints in 2002 - a 50 per cent increase on the previous year.
The huge increase was ‘almost entirely due’ to complaints about the funding of continuing care in the wake of her February report, which criticised four health authorities for wrongly making patients pay for their own care.
‘My investigations showed NHS organisations struggling, and sometimes failing, to conform to the law and department of health guidance on this issue,’ the annual report said. ‘The indications were that the problems might be widespread.’
Abraham’s office received 1,300 similar complaints in the six weeks after publication of her report in February.
She has since asked NHS chief executive Sir Nigel Crisp to work with health authorities to ensure that local eligibility criteria meet the legal standard set by the 1999 Coughlan judgement.
‘In my view it is not for my office to embark on a series of investigations into matters which should fall on the health service to resolve,’ the report said.
The annual report says that 30 per cent of complaints made last year fell within her remit, and were investigated. Three quarters of these were upheld.
The Health Service Ombudsman for England, Annual Report 2002-3
'NHS funding for long term care of older and disabled people'
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