New ratings on NHS service performance to be introduced

The government is to introduce new Ofsted-style ratings to show patients how their local area's health service is performing in crucial areas.

As part of wider efforts to introduce greater patient power to the NHS, it will be possible to view ratings on how different providers are performing in terms of cancer, dementia, diabetes, mental health, learning disability and maternity care from next year.

The ratings will be broken down by clinical commissioning group and will be based on local data, as well as being verified by experts in each field. Initial ratings will be published in June 2016.

With this initiative, the government will be aiming to spread best practice and help bring about improvement where services are underperforming, while making healthcare services more accountable.

Health secretary Jeremy Hunt said: "By being more transparent than ever before about crucial services and freeing up more time for GPs to care, we really can make NHS patients the most powerful in the world."

The government has also announced that it will introduce a single payment system to covers all transactions, stopping GP practices chasing different organisations for payment, while making surgeries paperless by 2018.