How the NHS measures up

doi:10.1136/bmj.a385

From trainee to consultant, BMJ Group offers doctors around the world tailored information, special events, learning resources and recruitment services at every step along their career path.

... by doctors, for doctors, for patients
We are open for entries!

Online learning

BMJ Learning

High-quality CME / CPD for doctors and other healthcare professionals. BMJ Learning features hundreds of accredited, peer-reviewed learning modules in text, video, and audio formats. Find out more

Courses and Qualifications

BMJ Masterclasses

BMJ Masterclasses, led by experts, help clinicians to use the latest evidence and recent guidelines in practice and meet their CPD/CME requirements. Find out more

Exam Preparation

The leading provider of online exam preparation, helping over 167,000 healthcare professionals to pass their exams. Find out more

onExamination

Search all BMJ comment articles:

From

Limit by

Our online table of contents is updated at least twice each day. Read all articles published in the last 7 days.
Keep up to date with cardiology: Access the latest cardiovascular medicine resources from across BMJ Group.
The BMJ iPad app brings you the best of print and online, including live links to the latest news, blogs, video, and podcasts. Get the BMJ iPad app.
OPEN ACCESS: All research articles are freely available online, with no word limit. Find out more about the BMJ's open access policy. Submit your paper.
Countdown to London 2012: BMJ Group's Olympics portal highlights latest Olympics and sports medicine-themed research, comment and learning

Access to the full text of this article requires a subscription or payment. Please log in or subscribe below.

Tony Delamothe, deputy editor

¹BMJ, London WC1H 9JR

tdelamothe{at}bmj.com

In the fifth article in his series, Tony Delamothe examines two important factors in judging the success of the UK health system: the satisfaction of its users and how it rates compares with other countries

The previous four articles in this series have dealt with how the founding principles of the NHS have fared over the past 60 years.1 2 3 4 I have judged them against the utopian aspirations of 1940s Britain for a national health service that was universal, equitable, comprehensive, high quality, centrally funded, and free at the point of delivery. Much of my attention has therefore been directed backwards and inwards.

In this article, I want to look outwards. Firstly, I want to capture what the British public thinks of the NHS today. And secondly, I want to see how the NHS compares with other healthcare systems that share many of the NHS’s underlying principles.

What does the UK think of the NHS?

People seem happy with their NHS care, with more than 90% consistently rating their inpatient care as good, very good, or excellent (fig 1⇓).5 In a 2006 survey for the Department of Health, 74% of those who attended a general practice or local healthcare centre were completely satisfied that their main reason for attending had been dealt with. Of the others, 22% were satisfied “to some extent” and only 4% were not satisfied at all.6

Fig 1 Adult patients’ ratings of inpatient care, England, 2002-75

Although the general public tends to have a somewhat lower opinion of the NHS than patients with recent experience of NHS care, British Social Attitudes surveys show net satisfaction with the NHS is at its highest for 20 years (fig 2⇓).7 Net satisfaction varies—between 62% for general practice and 27% for hospitals. Nevertheless, these proportions obscure a …