The Directory
What is The Directory?
The HQIP ‘Directory’ is a guidance document that collates high level information supplied by the teams that manage national audit and quality improvement programmes. It is a tool/resource designed to assist healthcare service providers in planning and reporting on their audit activity each year. It is refreshed regularly and includes:
- NCAPOP projects (commissioned by HQIP)
- Projects included in the NHS England Quality Accounts List (and operated by other organisations)
- Other national quality improvement projects operated by other organisations.
The Directory includes information on projects that plan to run during the forthcoming financial year, as well as those that ran during the previous financial years. The FAQs below give further information in relation to trust requirements.
How can The Directory help you?
Healthcare service providers may find The Directory useful when planning audit activity and preparing their Quality Accounts written report. The Directory aims to provide a quick, one-stop, high-level source of information.
Where does The Directory information derive from?
The information included in The Directory is supplied by the teams that manage national audit and quality improvement programmes. Please refer to individual listings on ‘The Directory’ worksheet and contact the relevant provider organisation directly for further information.
Further information on NCAPOP published reports, recommendations and infographics are available for download, in single point of reference documents, on the HQIP ‘NHS Trusts’ web page here.
Provider survey
If you manage a national audit or quality improvement programme and would like to be included in The Directory 2024-25, or to have an existing listing revised, please contact Helen Baron ([email protected]) and complete the survey using this link.
Note that NCAPOP audit programmes do not need to complete a survey – please contact Helen Baron ([email protected]) for further information.
Current version of The Directory
This revised version of The Directory 2024-25 includes amendments to a small number of programme/workstream listings.
If you have previously visited this webpage we advise carrying out a hard refresh to ensure you are viewing the latest version. You can do this by simultaneously holding down the Ctrl key and F5 key on a PC, or by holding the Shift key and clicking the refresh icon on a Mac.
FAQs for The Directory
- How do trusts confirm which projects they must participate in?
The NHS Standard Contract (‘SC26 Clinical Networks, National Audit Programmes and Approved Research Studies’ specifically 26.1.2 and sub bullets 26.1.2.1 / 26.1.2.2 / 26.1.2.3’) sets out the requirement to participate in:
- any national programme within the National Clinical Audit and Patient Outcomes Programme (NCAPOP);
- any other national clinical audit or clinical outcome review programme managed or commissioned by HQIP; and
- any national programme included within the NHS England Quality Accounts List for the relevant Contract Year.
The NHS Standard Contract also gives commissioners the power to require remedial action of NHS healthcare providers who fail to participate, with scope for withholding funding in the event of sustained non-compliance.
See weblink here: 03-NHS-Standard-Contract-2024-to-2025-Service-Conditions-full-length–version-2-March-2024.pdf (england.nhs.uk)
- Does The Directory provide information on the levels of reporting for projects and workstreams?
The Directory includes information on ‘levels of reporting’, where provided by the project team. A link to dynamic reporting, dashboard or data resources is also provided where available.
- Does The Directory provide information about the types of clinical service an project is recruiting from?
This information is available within The Directory
The current healthcare settings provided in The Directory are:
- NHS primary care
- NHS secondary or tertiary care
- NHS mental healthcare
- NHS community care
- Social care
- Independent sector healthcare (non-NHS)
- Paediatric
- NHS ambulance care
- NHS-funded care delivered by independent provider
The Directory also now includes a ‘Topic’ field allowing users to filter by clinical ‘topics’ or medical specialties.
- Does The Directory include information about patient inclusion and exclusion criteria, such as ages, contraindications etc?
This information is available within The Directory currently and has been provided by the project teams.
- Are dates for data collection and data submission available?
Dataset periods for relevant financial years are included The Directory and have been provided by the project teams, along with relevant dataset submission close dates.
- Does The Directory indicate the data to be collected by ‘type’ ie. clinical records data, PROMs and PREMs, organisational questionnaires?
This information is not currently contained in The Directory and may be found by visiting the programme/provider organisation website or contacting the project directly.
- Does The Directory show how data is submitted to an audit?
The new version of The Directory includes information on method(s) of data submission as ‘Extraction from existing data source(s)’ and/or ‘Bespoke data submission by healthcare provider’.
- Does The Directory provide final report dates to facilitate local trust improvement?
This information is available via:
- The Directory
- Project communications
- Within the ‘NHS Trusts Resources’ section of the HQIP website at: https://www.hqip.org.uk/resources/nhs-trusts/
- What is the mechanism for a trust to feedback improvement suggestions to an audit?
This information is not contained within The Directory and may be found by visiting the programme/provider organisation website or contacting the project directly.
- Could individual case ascertainment statements be provided to each trust by projects to support Quality Accounts reporting?
- NCAPOP providers are only able to obtain information they need for this retrospectively from external data sources and hence information may not be received in time for quality accounts reporting. Case ascertainment requires up-to-date information about data collection and this is only available from local trust and hospital systems as to which patients have been coded within that financial period. The other source of this information is from HES data but this can take time.
- Which projects outside of NCAPOP charge trusts a subscription fee?
Information relating to non-NCAPOP project fee charging is available within The Directory and has been provided by the relevant project teams. Further information may be found by contacting the relevant project directly.
- Does The Directory provide information on the geographical coverage of projects and workstreams?
The new version of The Directory includes information on geographical coverage across Devolved Nations and Crown Dependencies, where provided by the project team.