Patient-Led Assessments of the Care Environment (PLACE), 2023 - England

The number of assessments of conducted and completed in 2023 was 1069; 133 more than 2022 (where 936 were undertaken). However, due to organisational changes (e.g., mergers, name changes, hospital closures, change of purpose, transfer of services and sites between providers) and continuing pressures on services due to the pandemic new organisations joining the programme the number of ‘new’ assessments (i.e., those undertaken at hospitals either not assessed in 2022 or assessed by a different provider) 229.

The PLACE collection is voluntary but is usually completed by all NHS Trusts with eligible sites, as was the case in 2023. The true number of independent/private healthcare providers eligible for the collection is unknown, but 203 sites (based on EFM organisation type, rather than self-declared PLACE organisation type) provided PLACE data in 2023.

For single site organisations without inpatient facilities, we do not provide an organisation score (as the assessment no longer includes the number of beds, and organisation scores are weighted by these). 

From 2019, organisation scores and national and commissioning region average scores are weighted by the number of inpatient beds; any sites which are without inpatient facilities are not included in these average calculations. This differs from previous PLACE calculations, where these sites were given a default value of 1 bed, which was used in the calculations of average scores. 

A comprehensive review was made of the PLACE programme following the 2018 collection. The 2019 established a new baseline, and scores are not comparable with any previously published. 

For the last two years we have enforced patient assessor minimums to provide more consistent reporting, but 2023 results should not be compared with those from 2022  as last year’s programme was heavily impacted by the covid-19 pandemic (so we received fewer completed assessments), further reduced by the need to enforce minimum patient assessor numbers.

For comparability of earlier PLACE results (2019 and before), please see the Data Quality Report published alongside the 2019 results, which is available here:

https://digital.nhs.uk/data-and-information/publications/statistical/patient-led-assessments-ofthe-care-environment-place

The 2023 programme was less impacted by the covid-19 pandemic, as such we seen an increase in the number of completed assessments in comparison to 2022.