We are very happy to share that InHealth Reporting has become the first Radiographer-Led Reporting Service to achieve Quality Standard for Imaging (QSI) accreditation.
The QSI is a collaboration between The Royal College of Radiologists (RCR) and the College of Radiographers (CoR), setting the national quality criteria for imaging services, a framework for both the NHS and private sector to provide consistently high-quality services delivered by competent staff working in safe environments. The standard applies to all four UK countries and includes NHS, commercial and not-for-profit imaging services. Services meeting the standard are independently accredited by the United Kingdom Accreditation Service (UKAS).
As a prestige accreditation, achieving QSI provides assurance that InHealth Reporting has the competence to consistently deliver a safe and cost-effective customer-focussed reporting service, while managing risks. The accreditation sets a minimum level of expectation rather than a ceiling of quality, against which a service assesses, and makes continuous improvements to, ensuring a high-quality outcome for everyone as part of the service. Accreditation to standards is supported by NHS England, NHS Northern Ireland and NHS Wales, and recognised by the Care Quality Commission (CQC).
So what’s next?
An extraordinary amount of diligence and commitment to guarantee robust processes was required to achieve the accreditation, with buy-in and support from all levels of the service, but that was just the start.
A longer-term commitment and an ongoing process of demonstrating quality improvement is needed, not just to maintain accreditation but also ensure provision of the highest possible quality to our service users.
This longer-term commitment has already started and InHealth Reporting have two further major achievements to work towards accomplishing by October this year:
- Transition of our existing accreditation for plain film on-site and teleradiology service to the newly issued QSI standards
- Extension of scope to cover our new multi-modality teleradiology reporting service
The InHealth Reporting team are rightly proud of achieving this accreditation and know that all the sweat and tears were worth it!
