Care Inspectorate puts PainChek at the forefront of innovation in its quality improvement plan
Scotland’s care regulator, the Care Inspectorate, has issued its Quality Improvement Plan for 2023/24, which features PainChek as a key technology within the ‘innovation’ pillar of its three-year quality improvement and involvement strategy.
The Care Inspectorate is dedicated to promoting quality improvement (QI) in social care, social work, local health and social care partnerships, and early learning and childcare.
Its strategy is built around four key pillars aimed at improving quality and participation: quality improvement capacity and capability; innovation; involvement and equalities; and quality improvement support.
A critical component of the ‘innovation’ pillar is phase two of the Care Inspectorate’s ‘test of change’ initiative. This initiative focuses on trialling PainChek with up to 15 services with the aim of improving pain assessment and enhancing the overall quality of care.
Using a quality improvement approach for innovation, the Care Inspectorate plans to test new ways of working and approaches to addressing complex issues within the industry. Collaborating with partners across the health and care sector, the overarching goal is to influence policy and practice.
PainChek is a regulatory-cleared medical device for the assessment of pain, enabling best-practice pain management for people living with pain in any environment, from those who cannot reliably self-report their pain, those who can, and for those whose ability to self-report their pain fluctuates.
This endorsement from the Care Inspectorate supports the expansion of PainChek in the UK, providing a pathway to more than 440,000 aged care beds and across broader social care services, including home care.
Tandeep Gill, Head of Business Development UK&I, PainChek, commented: “We are delighted that the Care Inspectorate in Scotland has placed PainChek at the forefront of innovation in its quality improvement plan.
“Over the last 12 months, PainChek has been working collaboratively with the Care Inspectorate on an improvement pilot in Lothian, with positive outcomes including medication optimisation, reductions in falls, and reduced dependency rates, as pain is being promptly identified and monitored using the PainChek system.”
The Care Inspectorate has stated that it will be continuing its work with PainChek to expand the solution to different services across Scotland to improve the quality of care for people living with dementia and learning disabilities in anticipation of a broader expansion across Scotland.
