A TOP York health economist has attacked proposed new health "league tables" and warned they could "distort" the health service.

The new, expanded league tables, put out to consultation last week, are part of the Government's attempt to boost clinical performance.

Under the proposals, "performance indicators" would be set up to cover six aspects of health care, ranging from whether treatment was successful or not to the way patients felt they were treated, access to services and the efficiency and effectiveness of treatments.

But Professor Trevor Sheldon, of York University's NHS Centre for Reviews and Discrimination, warned the real job of improving health care could be harmed as managers' rush to meet simplistic targets.

He said there was not enough known about the way league tables affected patient care.

He told the Evening Press: "We don't know how much good they can do but there is a body of evidence that they can do harm and that before you let them loose on the NHS you should do some research to see what effect they do have."

Writing in an editorial in this week's British Medical Journal, Prof Sheldon said more important than league tables was for local health authorities, GPs and other health workers to draw up guidelines on best care.

League tables could lead to a "series of managerial responses that give the impression of doing something without addressing the real issues", he said.

"This could increase further the cynicism that many in the NHS have about data."

Speaking to the Evening Press from a conference in Oxford, he said: "What we need is local examination of performance within the context of frameworks of care based on evidence, looking at good ways of providing care and improving quality.

"Having national indicators of this sort doesn't help that. They give the impression that the Government is more wanting to be seen to be improving things than actually improving quality."

Dr Robert McEwan, head of health authority performance reviews at the NHS Executive, agreed current league tables were "not ideal".

But he said: "That's why we are consulting about them. That's why we're going to improve them. One thing we cannot do is make continuing investments (in the NHS) year on year without evidence that it is being used to good effect."

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