Health minister rebuts accusation over NHS star ratings
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《英国医生杂志》
The row over late changes to the 2002 star ratings of "high profile" NHS trusts gathered momentum last week as health minister John Reid faced down allegations in the House of Commons.
Tim Yeo, shadow health and education secretary, called for an inquiry into the allegations that the former health secretary, Alan Milburn, had authorised last minute changes to the 2002 star ratings for several trusts.
But Mr Reid said the NHS chief executive, Nigel Crisp, had written to Liam Fox, the Conservative party chairman, saying he was "satisfied that no changes were made to the methodology in order to manipulate the rating of an individual trust" and that "political considerations" had not influenced the late changes.
The last minute changes made to ratings for 25 acute trusts, as well as a number of specialist and ambulance trusts, boosted their final rating, leading to financial gains and significant freedoms from central control. In 2002, having three stars meant that trusts could receive up to ￡1m ($1.9m; �1.4m) to improve services, go ahead with capital projects worth less than ￡10m without central approval, and retain up to ￡10m from land sales.
According to emails leaked to the magazine Health Service Journal a civil servant in the office of the former health secretary queried the two star rating that had been given to a number of high profile trusts. These included South Durham Health Care Trust, which serves the prime minister抯 constituency.
A day later the ratings had been recalculated and the trust had been awarded three stars, as had Basildon and Thurrock General Hospitals NHS Trust. Other trusts also moved from one star to two stars, but no trust had stars removed.
The changes took place two days before the ratings had to be cleared for publication. Giles Willmore, head of the Department of Health抯 performance development unit, warned that it would make "the scoring methodology more difficult to explain and less transparent."
The last minute changes were made after the methods for calculation had been agreed with the Commission for Health Improvement and "reality checked" by the directorates of health and social care. What is not clear is the criteria used to make these late changes.
A Department of Health spokesperson said: "There抯 nothing unusual about changes to star ratings status before publication. You could pick a number of trusts and track changes in the weeks beforehand. Calculating results is a constantly evolving process.
"It would have been odd for the secretary of state not to have been involved in commenting upon and raising queries about the formative stages of a brand new system of evaluation."
Alastair McLellan, editor of the Health Service Journal, said the health department had still failed to answer why the changes had been requested. "If he is going to query them he has got to do it on an equitable basis and a transparent basis," said Mr McLellan.(Banbury Claire Laurent)
Tim Yeo, shadow health and education secretary, called for an inquiry into the allegations that the former health secretary, Alan Milburn, had authorised last minute changes to the 2002 star ratings for several trusts.
But Mr Reid said the NHS chief executive, Nigel Crisp, had written to Liam Fox, the Conservative party chairman, saying he was "satisfied that no changes were made to the methodology in order to manipulate the rating of an individual trust" and that "political considerations" had not influenced the late changes.
The last minute changes made to ratings for 25 acute trusts, as well as a number of specialist and ambulance trusts, boosted their final rating, leading to financial gains and significant freedoms from central control. In 2002, having three stars meant that trusts could receive up to ￡1m ($1.9m; �1.4m) to improve services, go ahead with capital projects worth less than ￡10m without central approval, and retain up to ￡10m from land sales.
According to emails leaked to the magazine Health Service Journal a civil servant in the office of the former health secretary queried the two star rating that had been given to a number of high profile trusts. These included South Durham Health Care Trust, which serves the prime minister抯 constituency.
A day later the ratings had been recalculated and the trust had been awarded three stars, as had Basildon and Thurrock General Hospitals NHS Trust. Other trusts also moved from one star to two stars, but no trust had stars removed.
The changes took place two days before the ratings had to be cleared for publication. Giles Willmore, head of the Department of Health抯 performance development unit, warned that it would make "the scoring methodology more difficult to explain and less transparent."
The last minute changes were made after the methods for calculation had been agreed with the Commission for Health Improvement and "reality checked" by the directorates of health and social care. What is not clear is the criteria used to make these late changes.
A Department of Health spokesperson said: "There抯 nothing unusual about changes to star ratings status before publication. You could pick a number of trusts and track changes in the weeks beforehand. Calculating results is a constantly evolving process.
"It would have been odd for the secretary of state not to have been involved in commenting upon and raising queries about the formative stages of a brand new system of evaluation."
Alastair McLellan, editor of the Health Service Journal, said the health department had still failed to answer why the changes had been requested. "If he is going to query them he has got to do it on an equitable basis and a transparent basis," said Mr McLellan.(Banbury Claire Laurent)