NHS blame culture sees nurses referred to regulator without investigations

Hospitals and care homes are failing to properly investigate incidents before referring nurses to their regulator, fuelling a blame culture and repeat failures, the head of the nursing watchdog has told The Independent.

In her first national interview, Andrea Sutcliffe, head of the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) said some employers were referring nurses without any investigation at all, while half of initial enquiries to the NMC were rejected or required further work.

She told The Independent this emphasis on blaming the individual meant underlying causes of safety errors were being missed and so they were likely to be repeated. Her ambition is to transform the nursing regulator, which oversees 725,000 nurses and midwives across the UK, into a more forceful watchdog that will flag systemic issues of concern with NHS trusts and care homes.

In a wide-ranging interview, Ms Sutcliffe called on ministers to ensure that planned legislation to reform the way clinicians are regulated be made transparent and maintain the public’s confidence. She also stressed that the impact of coronavirus on nurses mental health meant rushing to restart routine operations in the NHS had to be carefully planned to avoid driving nurses out of the health service.

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Source: The Independent, 16 March 2021