LOCSU delivers… governance and compliance support

24 July 2019

 

The governance and compliance environment is increasingly complex. New regulations and guidelines covering topics from data protection to safeguarding come into force on a regular basis and can seem like a minefield for those that must comply with them.

Contractors need to proactively manage compliance in order to achieve the standards required to engage professionally and credibly with Health Service provision. At the same time, however, navigating through the compliance requirements of the major contracts and drafting the necessary policies is a huge administrative task. One of LOCSU’s core activities is targeted at easing that burden through the provision and management of governance support via Quality in Optometry (QiO).

Using QiO for contract compliance

The QiO checklists are condensed from the contract requirements and revised regularly to reflect the latest developments. By competing the checklists, contractors demonstrate robust compliance with NHS England GOS contracts and NHS Standard contracts. When the NHS Digital Data Security and Protection Toolkit (DSPT) recently came into force, we worked closely with NHS Digital to build a DSPT checklist into QiO itself that satisfied the requirements and was implemented through the familiar QiO environment, making it simpler for contractors.

To improve efficiency and reduce administration, NHS England and NHS Digital now have access to the QiO database of completed checklists, so that contractors no longer have to send their data to the relevant authority. Instead NHS England and NHS Digital can carry out compliance assurance checks independently, without any action needed by the contractor.

Support for policy drafting and implementation

Many of the checklist questions request information on the policies in place to ensure compliance. To make creating and implementing these policies easier, we have developed policy templates, guidance documents, general templates and so on that align with the best-practice requirements, which contractors can customise to their own organisation and use to benchmark their performance against national standards.

The existence of a robust and appropriate governance programme that’s consistent across the sector underscores the credibility of the industry and creates confidence among the commissioning community, which is why it is one of our core activities at LOCSU. We aim to provide best-practice guidelines to help contractors proactively manage their compliance responsibilities, while reducing the associated administrative burden.

If you need support with a governance and compliance issue, check out our online resources and get with touch with us via info@locsu.co.uk