Safe from harm
How The Health Foundation’s Safer Patients Initiative is reducing medical incidents in 24 hospitals and making healthcare safer for patients
Background
Around 16 million people are admitted to hospital each year in the UK. Most are treated safely and successfully. But in too many cases something goes wrong, often resulting in unnecessary pain and suffering, and even death. It’s estimated that one in ten patients in hospital experiences an incident that puts their safety at risk. About half of these could have been prevented.
The Safer Patients Initiative
The Health Foundation’s Safer Patients Initiative was set up in 2004 to find practical ways to make hospitals safer. The US-based Institute for Healthcare Improvement was commissioned to work with 24 hospitals across the UK to help them identify and implement changes to improve patient safety. And it’s working – after just two years the four hospitals involved in the first phase had on average halved their number of adverse events.
The initiative works in four clinical areas: medicines management, peri-operative care, critical care and care on general wards. It’s designed to be responsive to local needs, so hospitals can choose which areas they want to tackle first.
Safe from harm describes:
• how the two-phase initiative was implemented
• the results it has achieved
• eight key lessons for policy-makers.
Case studies
Safe from harm includes case studies from three hospitals that have achieved impressive results. At NHS Tayside, patient safety (as opposed to finance) is the first item on the executive team’s weekly agenda. Luton and Dunstable Hospital NHS Foundation Trust has developed an early warning system using colour-banded cards to quickly identify patients whose condition is deteriorating, triggering referral to a critical care team. And Torbay Hospital has piloted a ‘naked from the elbow down’ strategy among staff to reduce the spread of infections.
The briefing concludes that senior leaders can play a key role in prioritising patient safety – for instance, doing walk-rounds to hear patients’ concerns. The Safer Patients Initiative has shown that improving patient safety does not just involve systems and processes; staff at all levels need to be involved and empowered to make changes.
Who should read this briefing?
Safe from harm will be of interest to chief executives, medical directors, directors of nursing, heads of risk management and clinical governance, and national agencies concerned with patient safety in England, Scotland and Wales.
