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“It is absolutely essential NHS organisations and individual staff make every effort to learn from when things go wrong and for NHS trusts deal with patients’ concerns promptly, effectively and appropriately. This is an important part of offering high quality, compassionate safe healthcare.

"Of the 15,000 complaints that the Health Ombudsman received, nearly two thirds were sent back to local organisations, because they had not completed the NHS complaints procedure.

Missing opportunities

“This suggests that we are missing opportunities to resolve things at an early stage. It also suggests that a lot of effort could be saved if we did more to communicate how people can raise their concerns.

“It is striking that often what people most want is an apology or an explanation of what went wrong. We all know that things can go wrong in healthcare but where that happens people are entitled to be dealt with in a straightforward and respectful fashion.

Resolving complaints before full investigation

“Of the 4,000 or so complaints the Ombudsman did take forward, it was positive that the vast majority could be resolved before going to full investigation, often because there was no case to answer or an apology or explanation was what the individual needed. Of the 350 cases investigated, it was positive  that where trusts did get it wrong they accepted the recommendations put to them.

Open and accountable

"As the Health Service Ombudsman has previously acknowledged, a high number of complaints for one organisation does not necessarily equate to poor care. In fact, it may indicate the organisation has an open and accountable approach to handling complaints that actively encourages patients and their families to raise issues when they feel the right care has not been provided."