Following a European Union tender process the National Institute for Cardiovascular Outcomes Research (NICOR) will from 1 July be hosted at Barts Health NHS Trust to manage the new National Cardiac Audit Programme (NCAP).

NICOR is currently part of University College London (UCL). NICOR staff will transfer from UCL to Barts Health with effect from 1 July 2017. The initial contract with the Health Quality Improvement Partnership (HQIP) is for 3 years, until 30th June 2020.

NICOR collects clinical information from UK hospitals into secure registries established by the cardiovascular specialist societies.

We help the NHS, the government and regulatory bodies improve quality of care by checking that the care received by heart disease patients meets good practice standards. We do this by conducting clinical audit and by comparing patient outcomes, such as casemix-adjusted survival and readmission rates.

Our reports and online public portals help hospitals and health improvement bodies to monitor practice, inform patient choices about their place of care, and build public confidence in NHS cardiac care.

NICOR encourages research using real world data to complement and refine the lessons learnt from randomised clinical trials.