The Care Quality Commission (CQC) is an executive non-departmental public body of the Department of Health and Social Care of the United Kingdom. It was established in 2009 to regulate and inspect health and social care providers in England.
It was formed from three predecessor organisations: the Healthcare Commission the Commission for Social Care Inspection the Mental Health Act Commission
The CQC's stated role is to make sure that hospitals, care homes, dental and general practices and other care services in England provide people with safe, effective and high-quality care, and to encourage those providers to improve. It carries out this role through checks during the registration process which all new care services must complete, as well as through inspections and monitoring of a range of data sources that can indicate problems with services.
Part of the commission's remit is protecting the interests of people whose rights have been restricted under the Mental Health Act.
History
Until 31 March 2009, regulation of health and adult social care in England was carried out by the Healthcare Commission and the Commission for Social Care Inspection. The Mental Health Act Commission had monitoring functions with regard to the operation of the Mental Health Act 1983.
The commission was established as a single, integrated regulator for England's health and adult social care services by the Health and Social Care Act 2008 to replace these three bodies. The commission was created in shadow form on 1 October 2008 and began operating on 1 April 2009.
Organisation
Board
Chair: Peter Wyman, formerly chair of Yeovil District Hospital NHS Foundation Trust Kirsty Shaw, Chief Operating Officer
Chief inspectors
The commission has three chief inspectors who are also board members: Professor Ted Baker: chief inspector of hospitals (retiring March 2022) Kate Terroni: chief inspector of adult social care Rosie Benneyworth: chief inspector of primary medical services and integrated care
Non-executive
Louis Appleby, National Clinical Director for offender health, formerly the National Director for mental health; appointed 3 June 2013 Paul Corrigan, former health policy advisor to Tony Blair and former special advisor to Alan Milburn and John Reid; appointed 3 June 2013 Jennifer Dixon, chief executive of the Nuffield Trust and past board member of the Healthcare Commission; appointed 3 June 2013 Robert Francis QC, appointed 4 June 2014 Michael Mire, senior partner at McKinsey & Company; appointed 3 June 2013 Jane Mordue, interim chair of Healthwatch England, former deputy chair of Citizens Advice Paul Rew, appointed 4 June 2014 Mark Saxton, appointed 1 March 2018 Liz Sayce, appointed January 2018 Jora Gill Sir John Oldham, appointed January 2018
Previous board members
Previous board members have included: Chief executive: Cynthia Bower, 2009–2012 Chief executive: David Behan, 2012–2018 Chair: David Prior, 2013–2015; Jo Williams, 2010–2012; Barbara Young, Baroness Young of Old Scone, 2008–2009. Sir Mike Richards: chief inspector of hospitals, 2013–2017 Andrea Sutcliffe: chief inspector for social care, 2013–2018
Operations
In August 2013 the CQC stated that it was finding it difficult to meet their inspection target of GP practices and had therefore drafted in 'bank' inspectors and authorised staff overtime to deal with the backlog.
In October 2014 Field announced that the commission was going to begin inspecting health systems across whole geographical areas from 2015, including social care and NHS 111. There are suggestions that it could inspect clinical commissioning groups.
Behan admitted in March 2015 that the commission would not be able to inspect all acute trusts before the end of 2015 as it had intended. In February 2015 it reported that it was missing its targets for following up on the safeguarding information it received that might indicate that patients are at risk. He also said the CQC would update its oversight in line with the growth of new provider models and would begin looking at care quality along pathways to a greater degree and, for the first time, across localities.
The organisation failed to meet its inspection targets during the second quarter of 2015–16. 70% of adult social care inspections had been undertaken and 61% of primary medical services. An exception to this was inspections of hospital acute services where targets were slightly exceeded, an additional two inspections having been made in this sector.