Welcome to episode 21 of Continuous Quality Compliance

Today I am talking about… Regulation 20 Duty of Candour

The intention of this regulation is to ensure that providers are open and transparent with people who use services and other 'relevant persons' (people acting lawfully on their behalf) in general in relation to care and treatment. It also sets out some specific requirements that providers must follow when things go wrong with care and treatment, including informing people about the incident, providing reasonable support, providing truthful information and an apology when things go wrong.

The regulation applies to registered persons when they are carrying on a regulated activity.

CQC can prosecute for a breach of parts 20(2)(a) and 20(3) of this regulation and can move directly to prosecution without first serving a Warning Notice. Additionally, CQC may also take other https://www.cqc.org.uk/guidance-providers/regulations-enforcement/glossary-terms-used-guidance-providers-managers#regulatory-action (regulatory action). Which you can find in the offences section.

It also sets out some specific requirements that providers must follow when things go wrong with care and treatment, including informing people about the incident, providing reasonable support, providing truthful information and an apology.

Providers must promote a culture that encourages candour, openness and honesty at all levels.

CQC This should be an integral part of a culture of safety that supports organisational and personal learning. There should also be a commitment to being open and transparent at board level.

Definitions :

Openness – enabling concerns and complaints to be raised freely without fear and questions asked to be answered.

• Transparency – allowing information about the truth about performance and outcomes to be shared with staff, patients, the public and regulators.

• Candour – any patient harmed by the provision of a healthcare service is informed of the fact and an appropriate remedy offered, regardless of whether a complaint has been made or a question asked about it.

To meet the requirements of Regulation 20, a registered provider has to:

Make sure it acts in an open and transparent way with relevant persons in relation to care and treatment provided to people who use services in carrying on a regulated activity.

Tell the relevant person, in person, as soon as reasonably practicable after becoming aware that a notifiable safety incident has occurred, and provide support to them in relation to the incident, including when giving the notification.

• Provide an account of the incident which, to the best of the provider’s knowledge, is true of all the facts the body knows about the incident as at the date of the notification.

• Advise the relevant person what further enquiries the provider believes are appropriate.

• Offer an apology.

• Follow up the apology by giving the same information in writing, and providing an update on the enquiries.

• Keep a written record of all communication with the relevant person.

We will consider the size and type of services and the relevance of the regulation to the provided

regulated activity.

The registration inspector will check that the provider has robust systems in place to meet the duty of candour regulation. This would include, but is not limited to, training for all staff on communicating with people who use services about notifiable safety incidents; incident reporting forms which support the recording of a duty of candour notification; support for staff when they notify people who use services when something has gone wrong; oversight and assurance.

When they are inspecting the following KLOE’s will be looked at for compliance with Duty of Candour.

S2: Are lessons learned and improvements made when things go wrong?

Prompt...