§ Baroness Noakesasked Her Majesty's Government:
What action they propose to take to improve the quality of data provided to the National Confidential Enquiry into Perioperative Deaths. [HL121]
§ Lord Hunt of Kings HeathParticipation by the National Health Service in the National Confidential Enquiry into Perioperative Deaths (NCEPOD) has been mandatory since 1999. A similar requirement was placed on the private healthcare sector in 2001 through the regulatory system enforced by the National Care Standards Commission (NCSC). It is the responsibility of the Commission for Health Improvement and the NCSC to ensure full compliance by the NHS and private healthcare sector.
NCEPOD raised concern in its 2001 Report Changing the Way We Operate, and its 2002 Report Function as A Team about the accuracy of deaths reported to it compared with the Department of Health's Hospital Episode Statistics (HES). There may be a number of reasons for the differences, and departmental officials are meeting the Chief Executive of NCEPOD to discuss the reasons for the difference in the number of deaths recorded and to investigate ways that HES can better support NCEPOD work in future.