CODE AFA Practitioner Articles
IHAS Update
IHAS has been the acronym on everyone’s lips after the launch of their quality assurance mark in April. But are practitioners being drawn to register? Initial response looks lukewarm, at best.
The list of registered practioners in their online directory currently shows 11 registrant in London and ussex shows two registrants. And the success of the scheme seems even grimmer up north - Manchester. Bristol and Birmingham have only the Sk:n clinics. So far then, the scheme has hardly caught the attention of practitioners en-masse.
To be fair, the format of the listing on the IHAS website doesn’t do itself - or members - any favours. Rather than listing all registered practitioners on one page, IHAS offers patients the opportunity to search the online directory for a registered practice based on practitioner, address or contact details. While this does allow patients to check whether a practice they are considering using has signed up to the scheme, it also makes it tricky to choose a practitioner based on their registration with the scheme: should a customer be willing to travel within their locale for a registered practitioner, they would need to enter multiple searches to discover anyone based nearby.
While it’s fair to say that the scheme is still very much in its infancy, there hardly seems to have been a rush on membership. That said, the consumer launch is imminent which should help practitioners see the benefits of registration. If the public starts demanding a quality assurance mark, there may be a greater incentive for practitioners to sign up. But the initial response to industry self-regulation suggests that the scheme is not something that will attract members unless it has more obvious advantages or finds a big budget to promote itself to the public.
For more information see www.treatmentsyoucantrust.co.uk
