Clinical Audit

Why Use Clinical Audit? - Clinical Audit versus Research
NICE guide to Clinical Audit - Criteria for successful Clinical Audit
Clinical Audit at Basingstoke and North Hampshire Hospital
NICE Guidance

Clinical audit is concerned with improving the QUALITY of health care that the NHS provides to patients.

What is Clinical Audit?

Clinical Audit is defined as:

"A quality improvement process that seeks to improve patient care and outcomes through systematic review of care against explicit criteria and the implementation of change"
Best Practice in Clinical Audit (NICE/CHI 2002)

Or simply measuring whether you are:

"Doing the right thing, in the right way, for the right patient, at the right time"
Royal College of Nursing 1996

The overall aim of clinical audit is to improve patient outcomes by improving professional practice and the general quality of services delivered. This is achieved through a continuous process where healthcare professionals review patient care against agreed standards and make changes, where necessary, to meet those standards. The audit is then repeated to see if the changes have been made and the quality of patient care improved.
Healthcare Commission 2004

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Why Use Clinical Audit?

As a quality improvement tool, audit can demonstrate that real efforts are being made by dedicated hard pressed staff to develop high quality professional care to all their patients.
Best Practice in Clinical Audit (NICE/CHI 2002)

According to the Department of Health's Standards for Better Health 2004, Healthcare Organisations must ensure that "clinicians participate in regular clinical audit and reviews of clinical services"
Healthcare Commission Criteria for assessing core standards
Second Domain: Clinical and cost effectiveness C5

Clinical Audit versus Research

Clinical audit is not the same as research. Click here for the difference between the two.

National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) guide to Clinical Audit

In 2002, NICE published "Principles For Best Practice in Clinical Audit". This book provides clear statements of principle about clinical audit in the NHS. It is written primarily for staff leading clinical audit and clinical governance projects and programmes in the NHS however it should also prove useful to other people involved in audit projects.

Click here to go to the link to the document on the NICE website.

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Criteria for successful Clinical Audit

The National Clinical Governance Support Team have published "A Practical Handbook for Clinical Audit" (March 2005), which contains practical advice about how to improve the quality of local clinical audit. This handbook has been endorsed by the Healthcare Commission and NICE.

Click here to view this document.

Clinical Audit at Basingstoke and North Hampshire NHS Foundation Trust

The Basingstoke and North Hampshire Hospital has a clinical audit team who can help with all aspects of clinical audit.

Clinical Audit Team:

Christine Bagan:
Head of Clinical Audit Email: Christine.bagan@bnhft.nhs.uk Tel: 01256 313025

Julie Jones:
Clinical Audit Facilitator Email: Julie.jones@bnhft.nhs.uk Tel: 01256 313025

Diane Maton:
Clinical Audit Support Email: Diane.maton@bnhft.nhs.uk Tel: 01256 314876

Or just email: clinicalaudit@bnhft.nhs.uk

The Clinical Audit Office is situated in the Healthcare Library in the Ark Centre.

Clinical Audit Registration

All clinical audits should be registered with the Trust. For an audit registration form click here.

Clinical Audit Training

Clinical audit workshops are held monthly - please contact the audit team for more information.

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NICE Guidance

NICE (National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence) is the independent organisation responsible for providing national guidance on the promotion of good health and the prevention and treatment of ill health.

Currently, NICE produces three kinds of guidance:

"Technology appraisals - guidance on the use of new and existing medicines and treatments within the NHS in England and Wales
"Clinical guidelines - guidance on the appropriate treatment and care of people with specific diseases and conditions within the NHS in England and Wales
"Interventional procedures - guidance on whether interventional procedures used for diagnosis or treatment are safe enough and work well enough for routine use in England, Wales and Scotland

Guidance can be viewed on the NICE website or use the National Electronic Library for Health's Guidelines Finder.

For more information about NICE guidance please contact:

Basingstoke and North Hampshire Hospital Trust - clinicalaudit@bnhft.nhs.uk
or Tel: 01256 313025

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