National Cardiac Audit Programme
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The second National Cardiac Audit Programme (NCAP) report to be published in 2025 reviews the performance of cardiac services in the NHS during the financial year 2024/25. For some analyses, information is provided covering a three-year period from 2022/23 to 2024/25.
The report highlights observations in three sections:
- Patient safety
- Productivity
- Prevention.
There is positive news. Overall, most cardiac services have returned to pre-pandemic levels. Waiting times for elective cardiac surgery are beginning to fall and cardiac surgeons have been able to operate on more cases. The number of patients with aortic valve disease receiving new valves is at an all-time high. More ablation procedures have been performed for patients with atrial fibrillation. New treatments are being introduced for patients at high risk of conventional open-heart surgery and others to help prevent stroke. Outcomes are good and complication rates are low.
Whereas many hospitals and networks are achieving excellent results, others perform less well and the information from the NCAP allows organisations to determine how they can improve and whether they should initiate a quality improvement programme for a particular care pathway.
Some important areas need addressing. Four important messages are summarised succinctly in the accompanying Patient and Carer report, written by Sarah Murray and members of the Community Representative Group:
- Patients who think they are suffering a heart attack should call the ambulance services and not just take themselves to hospital;
- More attention is needed to ensure that patients admitted with heart failure or a heart attack are discharged on the optimal medical treatment to maintain health;
- Roll-out of new approved treatments is patchy and should be more uniform across the country;
- Hospitals should engage positively and provide timely data to the NCAP to support continual quality improvement.
The information is presented with an overall aggregate report (and the accompanying Patient and Carer Report) and specific interactive sub-specialty (‘domain’) reports for those interested in the detail. The information is available for hospitals, commissioners, regulators and the public, with the aim of improving patient wellbeing, safety and outcomes.