Complaining about NHS treatment adds further difficulties for complainants. - Susan Hodges and Richard Murphy lost their baby at birth.

'Why could no one tell us why our son died at birth?'

Extract:

"Nearly two years after their baby son Oliver died soon after he was born, Susan Hodges and Richard Murphy are still waiting to have questions answered. They have found their dealings with one of London's flagship NHS trusts perplexing and frustrating. Straightforward questions about what went so terribly wrong in the crucial minutes leading up to his birth have gone unanswered.

However, their experience of hitting a 'complaints brick wall' is not uncommon. More than 100,000 complaints were received by the NHS last year, with an increasing proportion going to independent panels because of dissatisfaction with the responses from hospital trusts or primary care trusts.

Despite government promises to overhaul the complaints system, the issue has now fallen even further down the list of priorities. The plan is to create a single system for dealing with complaints about both healthcare and social care, but instead of introducing reforms quickly, the government has embarked on a new consultation, which will begin in April. Officials have said there is no plan to introduce new reforms until 2009. By then, another 200,000 people will have been caught up in the complaints system."

"The campaign group Action Against Medical Accidents (AvMA) has been calling for years for reform of NHS complaints procedures to be speeded up. Peter Walsh, its chief executive, said: 'Far too many people are trapped in a system which is unwieldy and slow, and very often insensitive to their needs. Our view is that however complicated the complaint, no trust should take more than six months to fully investigate and respond to the individuals.'"

The Healthcare Commission should be remedying this situation, which has been going on for as long as there have been complaints about NHS care, i.e. for decades. It is a national scandal.