Patient Safety Day: 17th September 2019

Patient safety is the prevention of errors and adverse events to patients and should be at the heart of all decisions made in health care settings. However, the World Health Organisation suggest that 134 million adverse events take place each year, of which 80% are avoidable.

The aim of patient safety is to reduce the number of avoidable adverse events suffered by patients. At Burnetts, our Medical Negligence team assist clients who have suffered adverse events in clinical settings, many of whom come to us with the main aim of ensuring that what happened to them does not happen to anyone else. Accountability through clinical negligence claims is one of many ways patient safety can be promoted. It is hoped that when a clinical negligence claim is brought, the Defendant organisation will learn from the incident and take steps to minimise the risk of it being repeated. However, clinical negligence claims depend upon the patient being aware that the adverse event was avoidable and choosing to take legal action.

There are many initiatives within the NHS such as standardising and collaborating on best practice, which have at their heart improvements in patient safety. However, in order for patient safety to be maximised, it is critical that staff working within the NHS feel able to report incidents they are involved in without the fear of blame and recriminations and to be able to raise concerns about other professionals in a supportive environment.

An essential component of patient safety is therefore the “Duty of Candour” which essentially requires that there is transparency and openness with regard to adverse events, with patients being informed, offered appropriate remedies and given apologies. The duty of candour covers all NHS Trusts and care providers registered with the CQC. The General Medical Counsel imposes an ethical duty of candour on all doctors and the Nursing and Midwifery Council imposes a professional duty of candour.

Patient safety initiatives will never be able to flourish where there is a culture dominated by cover-ups and defensiveness. Sadly, we frequently see examples of attempts to deflect attention away from incidents. Most recently, University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Foundation Trust have been under scrutiny following the publication of their former consultant urologist, Peter Duffy’s book, in which he describes being forced out of his job after raising a series of patient safety concerns. It is now likely that there will be an external review of the allegations, which echoes a similar review carried out of the same Trust by Dr Bill Kirkup with regard to the standard of care provided in the Maternity Department. That report identified a series of failings in care which were compounded by a failure by the Trust to investigate and learn lessons from them.

It is hoped that this Patient Safety Day, awareness will be raised of the importance of openness and accountability in the healthcare setting with a focus on learning from mistakes and putting the patient at the heart of all decisions.

How Burnetts Can Help

Burnetts have specialist medical negligence solicitors, who are accredited by The Law Society and AvMA, who can investigate your claim and help secure compensation.

We have access to specialist medical experts and barristers who can advise in your case and will aim to obtain compensation for you as quickly as possible. Where someone has sadly died, Burnetts also have expertise in dealing with claims on behalf of the estate of the deceased. If the claim is on behalf of a protected party then our Court of Protection team will also be on hand to assist with the administration of compensation and navigating you through the whole process.

Our lawyers are also experienced at representing families at Inquests relating to patient deaths.

If you would like to speak to someone within our team to discuss whether you may have a clinical negligence claim then please contact our offices on 01228 552222.