Does better quality save money? This was the key question that the Health Foundation's Chief Executive Stephen Thornton addressed in his speech delivered to NHS healthcare professionals at this year’s NHS Confederation in Liverpool.
In his speech he spoke about the report commissioned by the Health Foundation and written by Professor John Øvretveit, Does improving quality save money?
In the report John Øvretveit proved that unsafe care and poor quality care are very expensive. Stephen also highlighted that the evidence from the report shows that, ‘…although the scientific evidence is not strong, improvement initiatives can reduce costs to service providers. Improving quality can make an important, if limited, contribution to addressing financial pressures.’
Stephen warned against over claiming and though the academic evidence shows us that improving quality can save money, he said, ‘…improving quality will only make a relatively modest contribution to the savings that the NHS will need to make in the difficult years ahead.’
He also spoke about the work that the Health Foundation is doing around improving quality and saving costs. This included the Shine programme that has given 18 awards this year to healthcare teams to develop new approaches and test out new ideas to improve quality and save money. Also,our Flow, Cost, Quality programme which aims to understand the relationship between patient flow, cost and quality in an acute hospital setting.
Stephen ended by telling the NHS that they need to act now and to use the research and evidence that is already available to implement tested quality improvement interventions.