Final Report > Chapter 6: Quality, Standards and Information > Introduction

Introduction

1 In this chapter we describe the approach to quality taken within the NHS between 1984 and 1995. We refer to the ideas and practices prevalent in the 1980s and describe how they started to change during the 1990s. Secondly, we turn to consider the way in which quality, such as it was understood, was monitored within the NHS during the period of our Terms of Reference, drawing on the examples of the South West Region and Bristol. A fuller account of the evidence received by the Inquiry on these matters is in Chapter 18 - Medical and Clinical Audit of Annex A together with expert papers commissioned by the Inquiry set out in Annex B. [1]

Footnotes

[1] Annex B, 10m Walshe K, Offen N. `An evaluative commentary on systems for review and audit at the United Bristol Hospitals NHS Trust from 1984 to 1995'. Also paper 11b Humphrey C. `Commissioning, Purchasing, Contracting and Quality of Care in the NHS Internal Market' and Annex B, 11c Humphrey C. `Medical and Clinical Audit in the NHS'