Regulation in health and social care: Improving the quality of care?

When people access health and social care services, they do so in the expectation that it will improve the quality of their lives. Where quality of care is affected, this can be a matter of life and death. However, a specific issue is how to ensure that the large volume of health and social care activities is of good quality, especially in the context of financial pressures, staffing pressure and workload pressures. This chapter analyses the functions and purposes of regulation to ensure good quality care. It examines the processes of regulation for health and social care to provide an understanding of how it works. This includes key bodies involved in the process of regulation. The chapter provides a critical analysis of the process of regulation to consider whether regulation can improve the quality of care.