HSIB: The impact of reorganising NHS services on patient safety (5 January 2023)

Summary

We know that NHS organisations may sometimes need to reorganise their services to consider how they can best deliver care to patients.

This can mean there is a need to repurpose existing environments, for example hospital wards or clinical areas. Staff may also be redeployed to deal with surges in demand when the pressure on the system is at its greatest. We commonly see this during winter, with ‘winter pressures’ wards, but we have also seen this become more common during other times of the year as the NHS deals with the lasting impact of coronavirus (COVID-19) and staff shortages in some key areas.

It’s important that the NHS has this ability to adapt to try and make sure it can deliver the best and safest care to as many patients as possible. The ability to flex in this way helps to keep the NHS operating when it is at its busiest and makes sure that patients can still access appropriate care.

Scott Hislop, the Healthcare Safety Investigation Branch (HSIB) Principal National Investigator, looks at the challenges faced by the NHS when flexing to meet demands and how to mitigate potential risks to patient safety.