Health Standards 2010

HCSU had revised its standards for GP practices and primary health care teams. The fifth edition (March 2010) incorporated all the organisational requirements of the Quality and Outcomes Framework (QOF) and the GMC contract. The standards had been slimmed down to a manageable eight, covering:

" Management arrangements
" Patient experience
" Providing primary health care services (click here for example standard)
" Management of medicines
" Records and information about patients
" Clinical governance
" Risk management
" Running the practice

Practices already working with the programme had commented on the relevance of the standards and the improvements in the clear guidance and referencing. Working with the HCSU accreditation programme provided assurance that practices had all the systems in place to meet their QOF target and to take up the challenge of new targets emanating from National Service Frameworks.