Current developments in the broader health landscape provide the opportunity to enhance the benefits the system offers to patients and health bodies alike. The growing recognition of the need to capture meaningful, accurate and accessible information about complaints means the new system can be much more than just a swifter, simpler process for handling complaints. Instead, it has the potential to become a unified source of learning for the NHS nationally, and a trigger for improvement at local level, enabling patients and local communities to access the information they need to make the right choices about their healthcare.

Much of the work that will enable this to happen is already in train. The Department of Health has committed that it will start to publish complaints data by hospital in October 2011 and foundation trusts will also shortly be required to provide information on complaints. The ‘Information Revolution’ provides a framework for making this information available, yet information about complaints is not yet included. We hope that in its response to the ‘Information Revolution’ consultation, the Department of Health will take the opportunity to develop and include standardised indicators and measures for both complaints and lessons learnt, so patients  can compare like with like.

Effective alliances between bodies will be important in enabling the collation, sharing and analysis of data. We look forward to working with our existing contacts, and building new relationships with clinical commissioning groups, the NHS commissioning board and HealthWatch, to contribute to  a common picture of complaint handling across the NHS in England. If the proposed changes to our legislation in the Health and Social Care Bill are passed, we will be able to share more detailed information with a wider range of health bodies about our decisions on individual complaints.

The proposed health reforms emphasise the importance of patients’ experiences within the NHS and aim to put patients at the heart of decision making. To achieve this, there needs to be an increased focus for all NHS staff – from those on the frontline to NHS leaders – on understanding and evaluating the totality of a patient’s experience, from the minute they pick up the phone to their GP surgery until the time they no longer need NHS care. The types of issues highlighted in this report – communication and the handling of seemingly minor misunderstandings and disputes – are at the heart of the patient’s experience.

As the Ombudsman said in her evidence to the Mid Staffordshire Inquiry:

‘I expect information about complaints to be high up on the agenda of Trust boards in terms of consideration of how the organisation is doing... We are in trouble if either patients and families are not being heard or do not think it is worth speaking up and Boards are not asking questions or being given information about complaints.’

Throughout all the changes ahead, we will be looking for evidence that the NHS is getting better at asking for feedback and listening to those in its care. As the data in this report shows, too often patients’ voices are ignored or unheard. By sharing the learning from the complaints we see, we hope to receive fewer complaints that feature poor communication in the coming year. An effective complaints system will ensure that the NHS listens to individual patients and their families and improves services for the future.