The white papers, quality indicators and clinical responsibility.

The coalition government has set out its stall in a cluster of white paper consultation documents. One theme to emerge is a commitment to monitoring outcomes. It is outcomes, underpinned by National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence quality standards, that are to be used to regulate the NHS and these will be made available to the public. This paper sets out the importance of measuring quality in the NHS and some of the principles involved in analysis, presentation and interpretation of results. Clinicians have a duty to improve patient care and measurement and comparison is one of the tools at their disposal. Clinical involvement in the development of metrics and quality indicators is essential for meaningful results and it is vital that clinicians now take ownership of the quality of the clinical data captured on their patients.