The Office of Health Standards Compliance (OHSC), a regulator of health services, is required in terms of the National Health Amendment Act (NHA) to monitor and enforce compliance by health establishments relating to breaches of the prescribed norms and standards regulations applicable to different categories of health establishments.
The norms and standards regulations applicable to different categories of health establishments provide a framework for the development of inspection tools that are used to inspect health establishments in different levels of care to provide safe and quality health services within the South African health system. The development of inspection tools is an important part of the process to ensure health establishments are inspected in line with the relevant regulations. In addition to the inspection tools, a compliance status framework has been developed to ensure that the OHSC and health establishments have a common understanding of the way inspection findings are determined towards the compliance decision.
The OHSC is in the process of developing an inspection tool for GP practices. The inspection tool development process requires that all relevant stakeholders be consulted. The inspection tool will be used to inspect the quality and safety of services provided by various GP practices. The OHSC adopted an incremental approach to the development of inspection tools aligned to the norms and standards regulations for inspecting and measuring compliance at various practices.
The OHSC is currently engaging GPs with the aim of communicating the norms and standards regulations and requirements for their inspection tool. The workshops will further create a common understanding of the way inspection tools are developed, as well as solicit General Practitioners’ inputs on the tool.
In that regard, consultation workshops with GPs were conducted in Gauteng in January, Limpopo in February, and Mpumalanga in March 2023 respectively.
Scope of norms and standards regulations
The regulated norms and standards for different categories of health establishments apply to public and private hospitals, public sector clinics and community health centres, private health clinics, and GP practices. Since the scale and range of services offered differ among these different healthcare sectors, different inspection tools are developed and used to measure compliance. The main categories of standards are:
User rights – User information; access to care; and waiting times.
Clinical governance and clinical care – User health records and management; clinical management; infection prevention and control; waste management; and responses to adverse events
Clinical support services – Medicines and medical supplies; diagnostic services; blood services; medical equipment
Facilities and Infrastructure – Management of buildings and grounds; engineering services; transport management; security services
Engagement dates with GPs in other provinces will be held as follows :
Date Province Area/City
26 August 2023 KwaZulu Natal Umhlanga
09 September 2023 Western Cape Durbanville
30 September 2023 Limpopo Tzaneen
07 October 2023 Mpumalanga Witbank
21 October 2023 Gauteng Ekurhuleni
28 October 2023 Eastern Cape East London
04 November 2023 Free State Bloemfontein
18 November 2023 Northern Cape Kimberley
02 December 2023 Northwest Mafikeng
For further information on the exact details of the scheduled workshops, please contact Dr T. Makola at (012) 942 7821 and/
or tmakola@ohsc.org.za, Ms. I. Loots at (012) 942 7848 and/or iloots@ohsc.org.za, and Mr. J Nkambule at (012) 942 7742
and/or jnkambule@ohsc.org.za.
