In this month’s edition of the Ombudsman’s findings, we highlight the importance of trust and transparency.
This month we published decision reports from 11 complaints investigated by the Ombudsman. Six of these were about health services, one about health and social care and four about local government. The outcome of these 11 complaints were
- Fully upheld: 6
- Some upheld: 3
- Not upheld: 2
The Ombudsman has also published one investigation report which details the care and treatment of a patient who died less than a year after being diagnosed with primary biliary cirrhosis. We are recommending that the board arrange for an independent review of the gastroenterology department after we identified similar failings in care in a previous report about the same health board.
Recommendations and feedback
We made 26 recommendations to public bodies. Eleven of these were individual remedies. These are actions we ask public bodies to take which will directly impact the complainant. These are often apologies but this month we asked two organisations to provide the complainant with further information or explanations as to their current position. It is important people know what to expect, and are kept informed of any delays or changes to their service. This ensures transparency and builds trust between public service providers and the people they serve.
We made a further 13 recommendations for learning and improvement and two asking public bodies to improve their complaint handling.
All our published decision reports can be read in full on our website.