Older people in NHS care suffering in silence.

Dame Julie Mellor believes over-65s either fear a backlash if they raise issues or don’t like making fuss

Dame Julie Mellor, the parliamentary and health service ombudsman

Dame Julie Mellor, the parliamentary and health service ombudsman. Photograph: Martin Argles for the Guardian

Older people might be “suffering in silence” under NHS care because they are reluctant to complain about the care they receive, the parliamentary and health service ombudsman for England has said.

Dame Julie Mellor believes over-65s either fear a backlash if they raise issues or don’t like making fuss, meaning watchdogs are only seeing the tip of the iceberg of serious failings.

“Older people are some of the most frequent users of the NHS but they are less likely to complain about treatment and care when standards slip to unacceptable levels,” Mellor said in an article for the Daily Mail on Monday.

“Our research shows that a quarter of older people don’t know where to go to complain about the NHS, despite using the service more often than people under 65. Complaints are a gift to the NHS because that is how improvements are achieved. Older people should be encouraged to complain and taken seriously when they do.”

Mellor said: “Almost 80% of all the investigations we carry out are about NHS services. Even though nearly half of NHS care and services are given to older people, only a third of the health complaints we investigate are about the care of older people.

“Of the cases we do see, there are common themes running through complaints about the care of older people,” the ombudsman said. “Misdiagnosis, staff attitudes, poor communication with patients and families, substandard nutrition, and patients not being treated with dignity, just to name a few.”

Calling for a “cultural shift in the way” complaints are handled across the health and social care system, Mellor said: “More needs to be done to tackle the toxic cocktail of reluctance by patients, carers and families to complain, and a defensive response from the NHS when they do.”

In an interview with the Guardian last year, Mellor accused hospital boards of “not learning from their patients’ experience to prevent mistakes from happening again”, warning that failure to listen sufficiently to patients and learn from their complaints – as happened in the scandal at the Mid Staffordshire NHS trust – was not exceptional.

http://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/apr/07/older-people-nhs-care-ombudsman