Approved Provider Scheme for ME/CFS clinics? Suggestion for discussion

I like this idea a lot. I think it is relevant to not just the UK, but wherever there are ME/CFS/LC services.

In my career, I had some involvement with organisation certification schemes. They made a difference to the quality of the organisations and also helped consumers identify which organisations were worth buying from. I reckon a quality assessment of clinics done by a patient charity could be really helpful. As well as highlighting problems, it would recognise clinics that are doing the right thing. I think it would be a very interesting exercise to develop the assessment.

It seems to me that health services in general desperately need the impetus for improvement that certification promotes. Maybe there is some quality management certification of health services already, but I doubt there is much that incorporates the consumer perspective. I'm interested to hear from people who have worked in health services what they think of the idea and how much external assessment already happens.

 

My concern in the UK is that none of the charities have the resources to inspect all the clinics, though Charles Shepherd is doing a great job writing to them about their published material being out of date and wrong.
I suspect we'd end up with BACME as a self appointed accrediting body, and we know they're still getting it wrong both on causes of ME and treatments, confusing pacing and pacing-up.

 

One way of doing it could be for the charities to approach other schemes such as the one in the first post to collaborate on an inspection regime. it seems to me if someone can be trained to inspect against brain injury care standards they could also be trained in care standards for severe ME.