Neil Grant, a regulatory lawyer in the health and social care sector, has recently written an interesting article in the Care Management Matters magazine that looks at how CQC have had to change their role during the pandemic and he evaluates their progress and reviews their future approach.

CQC’s primary method of regulation, the routine inspection, got taken off the table at the start of the pandemic due to the first lockdown. Since then CQC have had to change their role and rethink the way they regulated registered services in Social Care.

In May 2020, CQC introduced a more flexible way of working, called the Emergency Support Framework, which had an emphasis on the remote monitoring of services. This is where they would use telephone or online calls to Registered Managers to see how they were coping during the pandemic. One of the key areas of attention during the pandemic was the infection prevention and control (IPC) steps that are being taken in services.

On 7th January 2021, CQC published a consultation paper on its proposed strategies for the next 5 years that is called “The world of health and social care is changing. So are we.” that was based around 4 key themes:

1. People and communities
2. Smarter regulation
3. Safety through learning
4. Accelerating improvement

CQC will be providing their response to this consultation in May 2021. What is proposed is a radical change in the way CQC regulates the care sector. To a significant degree, it is informed by the new remote and virtual ways of working that CQC has had to adopt during the pandemic.

If you would like any more information on the above, please let us know. To get in touch, email [email protected].

As a specialist, family-run recruitment business, we provide a proactive and consultative approach to recruitment. We help organisations to target issues such as continuity of staffing, reducing spend where you have a high volume of agency usage and supporting those who have specific talent requirements or are in hard to fill locations. We can help with any immediate staffing requirements or longer-term recruitment projects to ultimately save you time and money on agency spend.

Click here to see what our clients say about how we have supported them throughout the pandemic.