Fewer NHS staff feel able to raise clinical safety concerns, data show

The number of NHS staff who feel able to raise concerns about clinical safety has fallen for the second year in a row, an analysis of NHS staff survey data has shown.

A report by the NHS’s National Guardian’s Office, which represents local “freedom to speak up guardians” who help NHS workers to raise concerns, said that staff were increasingly disillusioned and that they believed that speaking up was “futile,” which had “worrying implications for patient safety.”

Dr Jayne Chidgey-Clark, National Guardian for the NHS said: “It is not acceptable that two in five workers responding to the NHS staff survey do not feel able to speak up about anything which gets in the way of them doing their job.

“These survey responses show us that there is a growing feeling that speaking up in the NHS is futile – that nothing changes as a result. When workers speak up about concerns, including the impact of under staffing and a crumbling infrastructure, their leaders themselves may struggle to be heard when trying to address these concerns.

“I would add my voice to that of others that this urgently needs to be addressed".

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Source: BMJ. 9 June 2023