Friends and Family Test

Independent providers consistently ask patients if they would recommend their healthcare provider to friends or family members – the question known as ‘the friends and family test’ (FFT).  

Although this question is asked of both NHS patients (data published by NHS England) and privately-funded patients (data published by PHIN), because one cohort is free at the point of care, and the other is funded either by self-pay, employer or insurance, it is inappropriate to compare results between each group. 

Looking at NHS inpatient care, we see that over the past 12 months, around 98% of NHS inpatients treated by independent sector organisations would recommend their provider to their friends or family. By contrast, the figure the NHS trusts is 93%. 

When viewed by site, we see a distribution as below: 

PHIN publishes patient satisfaction information relating to privately-funded acute inpatient care. As discussed above, privately-funded and NHS patients are not comparable and PHIN follows a different methodology designed to capture the views of private patients.  

The latest tranche of patient satisfaction data for privately-funded patients covers the period from 01 July 2021 to 30 June 2024. 260 independent sites have submitted data relating to 495,507 procedures over that period. Considerably fewer NHS Private Patient Units (PPUs) have submitted sufficient data to publish over that period – just 26 hospitals covering 5,601 procedures. 

The proportion rating their experience as ‘very good’ was 86% at independent providers, compared to 84% at NHS PPUs. Overall, 97% rated their experience positively at independent providers, as did 96% at NHS PPUs.