Importance of policies and procedures in health and social care

Perhaps the first time you will see that policies and procedures are important in health and social care is when you attempt to start a care business.

In order to provide care anywhere in the UK you need to register with your national regulator where your service is based.

No regulator will complete your registration unless you have the necessary policies and procedures (that fit the criteria in the introduction above) in place.

Links to further information on registration requirements below:

• In Scotland The Care Inspectorate Scotland (see page 7/26)
• In Northern Ireland: The Regulation and Quality Improvement Authority (RQIA)
• In England: The Care Quality Commission
• In Wales: The Care Inspectorate Wales

Putting in place all the necessary policies and procedures at the same time as going through the other challenges of setting up a new care service is something many new providers struggle with, even if they have worked in care already.

Not only does putting together the policies and procedures take a lot of time, they also demand expertise in lots of different areas. Many care providers used to employ consultants to provide them with policy and procedure templates.

Now, more providers are using health and social care policies and procedures software. Its better value, easier to access, understand and update, with lots of additional features that help support compliance on an ongoing basis.

Policies and procedures are important in keeping your service users and staff safe. Policies set out your approach, attitude and values in a specific area, informing staff on why, for example, safeguarding service users, or whistleblowing is important, and how you want everyone to handle it.

Procedures are step-by-step guides to carry out specific activities, for example, administering medication to people, or providing food and drink.

Without policies and procedures in place your organisation lacks the rules and guidance needed to respond to specific situations, leaving staff to improvise or avoid action where it is necessary. This is not conducive to ensuring people are kept safe and well.

Maintaining robust, up-to-date policies and procedures is part of health and social care regulation. For example, under the CQC’s Regulation 17: Good Governance:

The systems and processes must also assess, monitor and mitigate any risks relating the health, safety and welfare of people using services and others. Providers must continually evaluate and seek to improve their governance and auditing practice.

In addition, providers must securely maintain accurate, complete and detailed records in respect of each person using the service and records relating the employment of staff and the overall management of the regulated activity.

Specifically, within component 17(2)(d) of CQC Regulation 17:

Records relating to the management of regulated activities means anything relevant to the planning and delivery of care and treatment. This may include governance arrangements such as policies and procedures, service and maintenance records, audits and reviews, purchasing, action plans in response to risk and incidents.

For providers in England, not meeting CQC Regulation 17(2)(d) can result in the regulator taking action. The forms of action will vary. Regulators will typically work with providers to help them improve where there is not a risk to people using the service or staff. When deciding what to do the CQC will use their decision tree.

Regulators of care across the UK can prosecute providers for the most serious breaches of regulations.

Not having the right policies and procedures in place does not fit in this category, however it could be used as evidence in the prosecution of a more serious failure, for example if someone was subjected to abuse and the provider did not have adequate safeguarding policies and procedures in place.

As I’ve mentioned above policies and procedures in health and social care require a lot of time and expertise to produce. While lots of providers used to outsource this work to consultancies (and pay a fair whack for it), policies and procedures software is now the done thing.

Access Policies and Procedures is a market leading polices and procedures solution, with all the documentation you need to implement and maintain regulatory compliance. Watch a short on-demand video demonstration of the software now.

You can even download the contents list of policies and procedures for domiciliary/community or residential care settings via the links below:

Contents list for Residential Care

Contents list for Domiciliary Care