Dr Foster believes itself to be the leading provider of comparative information on health and social care services. It's latest hospital guide has caused controversy. Nigel Hawkes in his BMJ column notes that it is a company that has been "granted at least one sweetheart deal — and possibly two — by the Department of Health". It tied the Healthcare Commission up in knots with its results (see previous post) and may be responsible for Baroness Young's resignation from CQC (see my post today).
We need independent academic opinion to publish comment on its latest hospital mortality data. Previous analysis in BMJ paper has suggested their "Claims that variations in hospital standardised mortality ratios ... reflect differences in quality of care are less than credible".
No comments:
Post a Comment