How Chekai© works, and why it does not conflict with the NHS.
Transparency Statement | Chekai© CHC Advocacy
People sometimes ask whether running a CHC advocacy service alongside NHS assessor work creates a conflict of interest. It is a fair question, and it deserves a straight answer.
The short answer is that it depends entirely on how the advocacy service is framed and what boundaries are observed. This page explains both.
Chekai© helps families ensure that the clinical evidence relevant to their loved one's CHC eligibility is complete, accurately framed, and presented in the language the National Framework requires. That is the whole of what it does.
It does not manufacture eligibility where none exists. It does not coach families to exaggerate or misrepresent clinical needs. It does not argue against clinical evidence or seek to override assessors' professional judgement. If the evidence does not support eligibility, that is what Chekai© tells the family, honestly, at the first conversation.
What it does do is close a specific gap. The same clinical picture, described in different terms, produces different results at every stage of a CHC assessment. Chekai© exists because that gap is real, it is documented, and it costs families funded care they are entitled to.
The National Framework places the eligibility decision with the Multi-Disciplinary Team, to be reached on the basis of clinical evidence, assessed objectively. The assessor's obligation is to make an accurate, evidence-based recommendation. That is not an adversarial obligation. It is a clinical one.
Chekai©'s purpose is to ensure the evidence available to that assessor is complete and correctly structured. Those two things serve the same goal from different positions. The assessor needs good evidence to reach a sound recommendation. Chekai© ensures the evidence is good. The patient's needs and the assessor's process both benefit.
A conflict of interest would arise if Chekai© existed to help families obtain funding they are not clinically entitled to. It does not. A conflict would also arise if the NHS's primary objective were to restrict funding rather than to assess eligibility accurately. Chekai© operates on the assumption that the Framework means what it says, and that most clinicians want to apply it correctly.
The CHC eligibility rate varies from below 4% to nearly 58% across different parts of England, under the same National Framework. That is not explained by differences in clinical need. It is explained by differences in how evidence is framed, how assessments are conducted, and how consistently individual ICBs apply the criteria. Chekai© exists for the families caught in that gap.
Munya Shonhiwa, who founded Chekai©, continues to work as a CHC Nurse Assessor at NHS Integrated Care Boards. Both roles are governed by the same National Framework and the same obligation to evidence. There is no philosophical tension between them.
There is, however, a specific operational boundary that matters and that Munya observes formally. Where he is working as an assessor at a particular ICB, Chekai© will not represent families whose CHC cases are being managed by that same ICB. The reason is simple: his knowledge of that ICB's internal processes, his working relationships with colleagues there, and his familiarity with how that organisation operates could give his advocacy clients an advantage that has nothing to do with the Framework. That would be a genuine conflict, and it is one that does not arise where the ICBs are different.
This boundary is not informal. A written Conflict of Interest declaration is submitted to every ICB at which Munya works before the engagement begins, disclosing both Chekai© and Filai, and the ICB's written acceptance is obtained before any assessor work starts.
In practice, this means:
Chekai© accepts instructions from families whose cases are being assessed by any ICB other than the one where Munya is currently engaged as an assessor. Chekai© does not accept instructions from families whose cases are being assessed by the ICB where Munya is concurrently working as an assessor, for the duration of that engagement. This boundary is self-imposed, formally declared, and updated whenever a new engagement begins or ends. It is the same boundary that governs any professional who holds dual roles in a specialist field.
Munya is also building Filai, a digital platform that captures and structures home-based care evidence in a format compatible with the Decision Support Tool used in CHC assessments. Filai addresses the evidence gap at the point of care, before the formal assessment begins, by ensuring that what carers observe and record day to day is captured in the language the Framework requires.
Chekai© and Filai work on the same problem from different points in the process. Filai helps build the evidence. Chekai© ensures it is presented effectively. Neither creates a conflict with the NHS's own objectives, which are to assess accurately and to fund those who are eligible. Both are disclosed formally to every ICB where Munya works.
Chekai© works exclusively for families and individuals navigating CHC. Never for ICBs, commissioners, care providers, or insurers. No win fees. No percentage of any award. No financial incentive to settle quickly or accept less than a family is entitled to.
Every inquiry is answered personally. If anything on this page is unclear or you would like further information, please do not hesitate to get in touch.
Contact Munya, info@chekai.co.ukCHEKAI© | www.chekai.co.uk | info@chekai.co.uk
Chekai© is a trading name of Links CHC Limited, registered in England and Wales. Company Registration No. 13370372.