Hospital rating plan 'too crude to succeed'

The government has been criticised over its plans to rate hospitals based on whether or not patients would recommend facilities to their friends and families.

Andrew Lansley's former policy adviser Bill Morgan stated the proposals are "too crude".

"There is talk of it being the new benchmark against which the NHS will be judged – the successor to waiting lists. But I don't want it to be," Mr Morgan said in a blog for his new employer, MHP Health Mandate.

However, he noted he broadly agrees with the idea of recommendations and stated that they are an improvement on how patients' experiences of their care are currently measured.

Secretary of state for health Jeremy Hunt - who replaced Mr Lansley in a government reshuffle earlier in the year - announced recently that NHS staff are also to be asked anonymously if they would recommend their organisation to their own relatives as part of the hospital ratings reform.

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