Chiefs seek action over red tape on wards

The NHS Confederation is urging the Department of Health and other agencies to slash “unnecessary bureaucratic burdens” on the health service.

It says numbers of administrative staff working in the NHS have dropped by 10 per cent and numbers of managers are down 18 per cent but in a report it suggests demands on NHS organisations have not fallen as a result.

The confederation warns that unless burdens are reduced, there is a danger frontline staff will be diverted from patient care to form-filling and box-ticking.

It says there is a risk the increasingly complex structure of the NHS following Government reforms and the increased number of organisations will add to the administrative burden on the NHS, amid expectations new demands could be ordered in the wake of the report into the Mid Staffordshire NHS trust scandal.

Confederation chief executive Mike Farrar said: “NHS organisations have a responsibility to provide the right information so they are accountable to patients and taxpayers. But we need to strike the right balance of providing information which allows patients to have a clear picture of the standards of care without spending a disproportionate amount of time providing the same information to numerous organisations in different ways.

“We are concerned that patient care could be affected because organisations and staff are distracted by the burdens of administrative requests from external organisations.”