Inspection reports for 14 GP practices have been delayed by months due to IT failures, the CQC has confirmed, following instances in which assessments were ‘lost’ within the system.
The watchdog’s chief executive Sir Julian Hartley told MPs last month that about 500 CQC reports were ‘stuck’ in the CQC’s system and could not be retrieved due to IT issues.
Now the CQC has confirmed to Pulse that the number quoted by Sir Julian referred to 350 assessments which had been initiated in the system prior to July 2024 and a further 150 which had progressed to the factual accuracy stage and were delayed between July and October 2024.
It confirmed that on 21 January there were 14 reports for GP providers within the system who had a site visit over 120 days ago, and had not been published. The CQC would normally publish a report within 50 days of the inspection.
GPs have told Pulse that delays with the reports have caused problems for their practices, penalising them in contractual arrangements and making it more difficult to recruit staff.
The delays were noted in two reviews of the CQC last year, which described the regulatory platform and provider portal used by the watchdog as ‘functioning poorly’ and ‘contributing to major delays in report publication’.
The CQC said that the impact of ‘poorly performing’ technology and delays to report publication have been ‘widely’ discussed with providers.
In November, the watchdog published an update on its website about technical issues and delays to assessment reports and said there were also ‘direct’ conversations with trade associations and providers who have flagged concern about the timeliness of their report.
It added that this means that providers will be ‘aware of delays’ with the production of reports, as well as being ‘in communication’ with assessment teams between inspection and publication.
But GP partner Dr Jamie Green, whose practice in Northampton waited over six months to receive a report following a reinspection, said that they were never given a formal explanation for the delay, which he described as ‘unacceptable’ and ‘harmful’.
The practice was reinspected in June last year after being rated ‘inadequate’ in 2023. But a new provisional report, which rated them as ‘good’, was only received last month.
Dr Green told Pulse: ‘There was quite a bit of chasing. We went to the ICB, and they said “you need to go back to the inspector”. I think we called the helpline for CQC.
‘They never turned around to us at any point and said “you’ve got an IT issue with your report, that’s why you’ve not received it”.
‘All we’ve ever heard is “it will be by the end of the week”. In fact, we’ve not actually received a formal confirmation that the reason we didn’t get our report was because of IT issues.’
He added that there were ‘significant’ issues with having in the inadequate rating ‘just sitting on your report’ due to the delay from the CQC.
The practice’s application to become a Yellow Fever Centre was rejected ‘on the basis of the previous CQC rating’ and nurse vacancies have remain unfilled ‘as interviewees have cited concerns about our CQC rating’.
Dr Green added: ‘I’m a GP trainer, I had to have a conversation with the GP dean around whether or not we’d be able to continue to train GP trainees.
‘We had a couple of nurses turn around and say they didn’t want to join the practice. They’d interviewed and then realised our CQC rating.’
A CQC spokesperson told Pulse: ‘Our technical team are working with operational teams to progress these reports and we are also looking at system updates which will resolve some of the issues leading to delays in publication.
‘The amount of time taken to publish some reports falls far short of what people using services and providers should be able to expect and we have apologised for this and are taking urgent action to ensure we can publish inspection reports much more quickly.
‘It is important to note that while the publication of some reports has been delayed, any immediate action that CQC have needed to take to protect people using services has not been affected.’
Sir Julian also admitted that the CQC has a backlog of 5,000 notifications of concern, including provider notifications of ‘major issues and incidents and changes’ as well as notifications of ‘major issues of concern’ from staff and members of the public.
Last year, a major review into the CQC commissioned by the Government confirmed ‘significant failings’ in the way the watchdog operates.
The damning review found that CQC ‘lost its credibility’ within the services and providers it inspects, with a ‘lack of consistency’ and transparency observed in CQC ratings of GP practices.
Another internal review, carried out by the CQC itself, at the same time found that a ‘fundamental reset of the organisation is needed’ and that the regulator ‘will never be able to deliver on its objectives’ if the current structure is maintained.
Following the findings, the RCGP called for a temporary pause of CQC routine inspections of GP practices, although it stressed inspections of practices where patient safety concerns have been raised must continue.
Additional reporting by Maya Dhillon
