Why Your Healthcare Business Needs To Know About CQC Inspections

CQC inspections form a critical part of healthcare businesses, but what are they? More importantly, why do you need to know or care about them? This article will break things down into digestible chunks so you understand the criticality of a CQC inspection and what it means for your healthcare business going forward. 

What Is A CQC Inspection?

Fundamentally speaking a CQC inspection is a special type of quality control inspection by the Care Quality Commission. The CQC is a key independent regulator for all social and health care businesses in the country. It will look at how your business is run to determine if it is: 

• Safe for patients

• Providing an effective level of care

• Actually caring for patients and treating them well

• Meeting the needs of patients by providing good responsiveness

• Bing led well and managed correctly

An inspector will always visit a new healthcare business and give it a rating from Inadequate to Outstanding. 

How Do You Prepare For An Inspection?

There are two ways to prepare for a CQC inspection. The first is obvious: maintain good practices throughout your business and commit to providing fair and caring services to all patients. If you’re doing this and running your business correctly, then you shouldn’t have anything to fear. 

The second option is to book a CQC mock inspection so you get to grips with what one is like. They can be intimidating if you’ve never experienced one - and it also lets you see what the inspector will do or check. It’s much better to fail a mock inspection than a real one; you’ll have plenty of time to make the necessary changes to improve your business’s rating when the real inspection happens. 

Why Does A CQC Inspection Matter For Your Business?

Think of a CQC inspection as the same as a food hygiene rating for hospitality businesses. While a bad rating after the inspection won’t mean your business has to close down, it will have an impact on your general reputation. 

It’s much harder to convince people to choose your healthcare facility when you have an Inadequate rating. Patients will struggle to trust your company because your CQC rating basically shows whether you uphold a good level of care or not. On the other hand, an Outstanding rating does the opposite and makes your healthcare business look fantastic and trustworthy, which draws in more patients. 

Furthermore, you can’t escape this type of inspection and your rating matters because it influences how often you’ll need to go through one. Here’s a breakdown of all four ratings and when the CQC will be back to inspect your company: 

• Inadequate - you’ll be inspected every few months until you improve

• Requires Improvement - you’ll receive another visit every 12-18 months

• Good - an inspector will come back every 2-3 years

• Outstanding - you won’t need an inspection for another 3-5 years

As you can see, achieving top marks gives you peace of mind as you don’t have to worry about future inspections for up to five whole years. 

Following on from that, this post has told you everything your healthcare business needs to know about CQC inspections. Excellent preparation is key; it’ll help you achieve a better rating to boost your reputation and avoid constant inspections in the future.