Don't forget to have your say on the future of inspecting and rating care

There’s still time to have your say on the Care Quality Commission's (CQC) plans to change the way it inspects, monitors and rates care services.

The regulator is seeking views on how it will inspect, monitor and rate NHS acute hospitals, mental health services, community health services, GP practices, out of hours services, care homes, home care services and hospice services. CQC is asking those who use health and care services, those who run or work in services and stakeholders, to take part in the consultation by Wednesday 4 June.

During the past year, CQC has been developing a new approach to the way it works. The main elements of the new approach are larger, more specialist and expert inspection teams led by chief inspectors, greater involvement in inspections by members of the public with personal experience of services, better use of information to identify risks and plan inspections and ratings for all health and adult social care services.

CQC is seeking views on a range of issues about the new approach including:

• The proposals for a rating system
• CQC’s view of what a service looks like for any of the rating categories – outstanding, good, requires improvement, inadequate
• The questions inspectors need to ask to determine if a service is safe, effective, caring, responsive to people’s needs and well-led
• The core services we always look at when we are inspecting
• The methods we use to gather information about services from the public
• The sources of information we draw on to help assess risk and decide when and where to inspect – our 'Intelligent monitoring' tool
• The frequency of inspections

CQC Chief Executive David Behan said: "We have had a good response to the consultation since it was launched in April. We have held events up and down the country, received comments via the website and tested our new style inspections in hospitals, mental health and community health services care homes and GP surgeries.

"The new inspections that we have carried out have given us valuable feedback, which we will use to improve our inspections.

"We are making these important changes to make sure that health and social care services provide people with safe, effective, compassionate, high quality care and encourage care services to improve. The new ratings should give people enough information for them to make important choices about the care that they receive.

"Throughout these changes, we will always be on the side of people who use services and it is important to us that we hear what people think of our plans."

We're holding sessions for providers, users of services and stakeholders with the relevant chief inspectors for General Practice, Hospitals and Adult Social Care on Twitter before the consultation closes on 4 June. Join the discussion on the day, or submit any questions or comments in advance:

Tuesday 27 May, 3-4pm with Professor Steve Field, chief inspector of general practice  #tellCQC

Wednesday 28 May, 1.30pm – 2.30pm with Professor Edward Baker, deputy chief inspector of hospitals  #tellCQC

Friday 30 May, 12.30pm – 1.30pm with Andrea Sutcliffe, chief inspector of adult social care #tellCQC

For media enquiries, call the CQC press office on 020 7448 9401 during office hours or out of hours on 07917 232 143.

Ends.