Strategy to improve the quality of care in England

The Five Year Forward View describes 'closing the care and quality gap' as one of three strategic challenges facing the English NHS by 2020. The need for a coherent national strategy for achieving high-quality, affordable care has rarely been more pressing, but how effectively do existing national decisions and interventions support clinicians delivering care on the front line? And, in a complex and dynamic environment with multiple players, how should the health service move forward to develop a balanced strategy for quality that accommodates longer term goals as well as more immediate political priorities? Research by a team at the Health Foundation has assessed how the array of organisations, initiatives and approaches to quality stack up as an emergent strategy. Four concepts were used to provide a yardstick for quality-related policies and activities to help identify potential imbalances, gaps and duplication. The findings of this work, together with suggested steps to rectify the issues identified, are described here.