More complain about NHS appointments
COMPLAINTS about cancelled and delayed NHS appointments have shot up one fifth in a year, new figures show.
Official data show the number of patients raising concerns about appointments has risen from 9,040 in 2013-14 to 10,800 in 2014-15.
There was a similar rise in complaints about ambulance services, the new figures from the Health and Social Care Information Centre show.
Experts said the figure could reflect the fact that a number of ambulance services took over the running of the 111 “non-emergency” line.
In total, 8,039 patients raised concerns with ambulance trusts, compared with 6,873 the previous year, an increase of 17 per cent, the statistics show.
Overall, there were 205,000 written complaints about NHS services in England in 2014-15 – 562 per day.
The figures include 121,000 complaints about hospital services, up 5.7 per cent on the 114,000 in 2013-14.
The number of patients raising grievances about the actions of clinical commissioning groups, in charge of local NHS budgets, rose by 40.4 per cent, though overall totals remained low, with 3,576 cases raised in 2014-15.
Most complaints were about the medical profession, including hospital doctors and surgeons, accounting for 45.4 per cent of all complaints about hospital and community services. The figure was almost the same last year.
Nurses, midwives and health visitors accounted for the second biggest number of complaints, at 21.1 per cent, a similar figure to last year.
By profession, administrative staff saw the largest increase in complaints, with a 23.2 per cent rise from 8,320 complaints in 2013-14, compared with 10,300 in 2014-15.
The patient watchdog, Healthwatch England, said the number of people who wish to complain is estimated to be nearer one million.
It is calling for a reform of the complaints system, including making it easier to complain and better complaints handling.
Anna Bradley, chairman of Healthwatch England, said: “It’s disheartening to see that more people have made written complaints to the NHS.”