Royal College of Physicians: PPE and improving safety (23 November 2020)

Summary

The increased use of personal protective equipment (PPE) during the COVID-19 pandemic has added challenges for healthcare workers and accessing the right PPE, or having the right equipment and staff, can be difficult.

This guidance from Royal College of Physicians (RCP) aims to help individuals working in healthcare to ensure PPE use does not impair patient safety.

This guidance, created by the RCP Medicine Safety Joint Working Group and led by the RCP’s Medicines safety clinical fellow, Jennifer Flatman, aims to raise awareness of key issues relating to the use of PPE. It includes recommendations on how you can help to mitigate against patient safety issues related to PPE in your healthcare environment and considers scenarios such as use of PPE when performing tasks and situational awareness.