Dorset Healthcare University NHS Foundation Trust: Policy for reporting and investigating deaths (August 2017)

Summary

The National Guidance on Learning from Deaths was published by the National Quality Board in March 2017 to initiate a standardised approach, ensuring that learning from a review of the care provided to patients who die should be integral to a provider’s clinical governance and quality improvement work. To fulfil the standards and new reporting, this policy identifies and highlights:

• The Trust’s governance arrangements.
• The Trust’s processes on reporting, reviewing and investigation of deaths, including those deaths that are determined more likely than not to have resulted from problems in care.
• The Trust’s processes, to share and act upon any learning derived from these processes.

Content

This policy covers how Dorset Healthcare (DHC) University NHS Foundation Trust responds to patient deaths in care generally, not just those amounting to 'serious incidents', which will continue to be dealt with under the existing NHS Improvement’s 2015 'Serious Incident Framework'.