Key Audit Documents
Audit Standards
NELA audits delivery of care against existing standards. Beginning in NELA Year 10 (1st April 2023), the standards and metrics against which NELA will report can be found here:
Standards are calculated using the following:
Previous to Year 10, NELA audited care against standards which can be found here:
Previous to Year 10, standards were calculated using the following:
Audit Standards - NoLap Cohort
Standards of care can be found here.
Standards are calculated using the following: NoLap Standards Calculations from April 2023
Audit Proformas
Please find below paper versions of the online data collection instrument for your information. All data entry will be carried out through the online data collection web tool; this proforma exists to assist.
The option for NELA Local Administrators to Enable/Disable some Quality Improvement questions on the webtool is still available (Section 8). Please contact us if you have any queries.
EmLap Outlier Policy
The NELA policy for defining outliers for NELA Year 11 (23 Apr 2024 - 31 Mar 2025) can be found here.
The NELA policy for defining outliers for NELA Year 10 (1 Apr 2023 - 23 Apr 2024) can be found here.
The NELA policy for defining outliers for NELA Year 9 (1 Dec 2021 - 31 Mar 2023) can be found here.
Data Burden Reduction Statement
In an effort to reduce the time and resource required to complete data collection, the NELA team review datasets annually. Data items that are no longer relevant or for which a sufficient amount of data has been collected historically are removed. NELA will also rely on data available from national-level datasets, like NHS England's Hospital Episodes Statistics (HES), where possible instead of asking audit teams for information that is already captured in these datasets.
Quality Improvement Plan
The NELA Quality Improvement Plan for 2022-2025 can be found here.
Understanding Practice in Clinical Audit and Registries: UPCARE Tool
The NELA UPCARE tool describes the key features of the audit. You can find an UPCARE tool for the programme and workstreams:
Cause for Concern Document
This guidance explains what the term ‘Cause for Concern’ means in the context of national clinical audits and clinical outcome review programmes. It is designed to support the organisations who deliver these programmes as part of the National Clinical Audit and Patient Outcomes Programme (NCAPOP) to understand:
Their own responsibilities,
What they should expect from healthcare providers and/or healthcare commissioners,
How HQIP should be engaged in the process,
The need to develop their project-specific Cause for Concern policies.
Find it here: Cause for Concern