Care and compassion?

All over the news in the past day or so is the Health Service Ombudsman's report on NHS care for older people, which makes challenging reading. Like the earlier Six lives report on treatment of people with learning disabilities, Care and compassion highlights particular cases to make its point. And it pulls no punches: "it is incomprehensible that the Ombudsman needs to hold the NHS to account for the most fundamental aspects of care: clean and comfortable surroundings, assistance with eating if needed, drinking water available and the ability to call someone who will respond." Of the 9 000 complaints properly made to the Parliamentary Ombudsman in 2010, 18% concerned the treatment of older people and of these 226 were accepted for investigation: "more than twice as many as for all other age groups put together."