Community providers

Information about community healthcare is generally less well developed than information about other areas. One significant issue is the lack of commonly agreed definitions, which is why we welcome NHS England’s ongoing efforts to standardise community care definitions and set out the core services commissioners should provide.

Using CQC inspection categories, ratings are available for community service providers for just 119 independent healthcare organisations and 14 NHS locations. We know from our members who work in community care and from NHS England data that this is only a small proportion of community provision. For example, the CQC lists 422 independent healthcare organisations and 341 NHS locations with a primary inspection category of ‘Community health – NHS & Independent’. This is partly due to definitions, with community services often provided by organisations that deliver a range of services.

Because this is such a partial picture, we are reluctant to draw comparative conclusions, but we can see that of those independent providers that have ratings, 92% are good or outstanding.