Robert Francis QC is due to publish his final report following the public enquiry into events at Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust on 15 October 2012. In anticipation of this the Kings Fund has published a paper looking at how the system of quality assurance needs to evolve to reduce the likelihood of quality failings in the future. As the introduction to the paper says It is widely expected that regulators will come in for further criticism in the autumn when the Public Inquiry into the serious failures of care at Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust reports. The Francis Inquiry?s Chair Robert Francis QC is likely to propose far-reaching changes at all levels of the system including to the external organisations that regulate quality. But will further changes to national structures and systems make such gross failings in quality less likely in future?
Among the issues the paper considers are the increased emphasis now placed on commissioners' role in assuring quality and the challenges that CCGs will face in fulfilling their part of that role.