Skip to content

News

Keep up to date with the latest news, research and activity in patient safety.

WHO claims true global death toll from pandemic is nearly 15 million

Almost 15 million people have died as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic around the world, new figures from the World Health Organisation (WHO) reveal.
Estimates from the WHO show that the number of excess deaths associated directly or indirectly with the pandemic between 1 January 2020 and 31 December 2021 was approximately 14.9 million – 13% more deaths than normally expected over a two-year period.
Excess mortality is calculated as the difference between the number of deaths that have occurred and the number that would be expected in the absence of the pandemic, based on data from earlier years.
WHO director general Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said: “These sobering data not only point to the impact of the pandemic but also to the need for all countries to invest in more resilient health systems that can sustain essential health services during crises, including stronger health information systems."
Most of the excess deaths (84%) are concentrated in southeast Asia, Europe, and the Americas, the WHO said, while some 68% of excess deaths are concentrated in just 10 countries globally.
It also found that middle-income countries account for 81 per cent of the 14.9 million excess deaths (53% in lower-middle-income countries and 28% in upper-middle-income countries) over the 24-month period, with high-income and low-income countries each accounting for 15% and 4%, respectively.
Read full story
Source: The Independent, 5 May 2022
Patient Safety Learning

Hospitals urged to use retired staff to cut backlog

NHS bosses in England are urging hospitals to offer staff more overtime and tempt retired employees back, to help tackle waiting lists.
A letter sent by NHS England said tackling the backlog that had grown during the pandemic would require a "number of high impact actions".
And many hospitals were already taking innovative approaches to the issue.
More than six million people are on waiting lists for treatment such as knee and hip surgery.
According to the General Medical Council, 21,000 doctors are due to retire in September.
And part of the plan would be to tempt some of those back by offering part-time opportunities to:
train students run virtual consultations help with follow-up check-ups. Other measures recommended by NHS England are:
removing caps on consultant hours - in some places senior doctors are limited to 40 hours a week - to offer extra shifts where safe offering more bank shifts - overtime opportunities for trust rather than agency staff increasing the use of NHS reservists - members of the public who have signed up to work for the NHS for at least 30 days a year - to help run wards, feed patients and provide support for the Covid-vaccination programme exploring taking simple procedures, such as cataract surgery, out of operating theatres and into other parts of the hospital. Read full story
Source: BBC News, 5 May 2022
Patient Safety Learning

Menopausal women lack basic support, landmark survey finds

Eight in 10 respondents in the largest survey of menopausal women in the UK said their workplace had no basic support in place and 41% said menopause symptoms were treated as a joke by colleagues.
The landmark study found menopausal women were being ignored in the workplace and by healthcare providers, with a third saying it took many GP appointments before they were diagnosed with menopause or perimenopause. This rose to 45% for black and minoritised women.
The findings were revealed in a report by the Fawcett Society, based on a survey of more than 4,000 women commissioned by Channel 4 for a documentary by Davina McCall.
“Menopausal women are experiencing unnecessary misery and it’s a national scandal,” said Jemima Olchawski, the chief executive of the Fawcett Society. “For too long, menopause has been shrouded in stigma. We need to break the culture of silence and ensure menopausal women are treated with the dignity and support they deserve instead of being expected to just get on with it.”
Official guidance states hormone replacement therapy (HRT) should be offered to women struggling with menopause symptoms, but there have been acute shortages of some HRT products and demand is expected to rise.
The survey found 39% of women said their GP or nurse offered HRT as soon as they knew they were experiencing menopause, but only 14% of menopausal women said they were currently taking HRT.
Read full story
Source: The Guardian, 5 May 2022
Patient Safety Learning

Hospital staff charged over patient mistreatment

Five healthcare staff have been charged with criminal offences as part of a major investigation into the ill-treatment of hospital patients.
Concerns had been raised over the welfare of some patients on the stroke unit at Blackpool Victoria Hospital.
Three nurses and two healthcare assistants will appear at court for offences including unlawful sedation of patients and theft, police said.
The charges relate to a period between August 2014 and November 2018.
Those charged are Catherine Hudson, 52, of Coriander Close, Blackpool; Charlotte Wilmot, 47, of Bowland Crescent, Blackpool; Matthew Pover, 39, of Bearwood Road in Smethwick; Victoria Holehouse, 31, of Riverside Drive, Hambleton, and Marek Grabianowski, 45, of Montpelier Avenue, Bispham.
They face charges including ill-treatment or wilful neglect, encouraging a nurse to sedate a patient, theft, supplying drugs and perverting the course of justice.
Read full story
Source: BBC News, 6 May 2022
Patient Safety Learning

‘Staff holidays’ delay death review by up to nine months

A coroner has expressed ‘serious concern’ after a trust-wide safety review – prompted by the death of a young mother – was delayed by up to nine months due to ‘staff holidays’.
An inquest heard that 25-year-old Natasha Adams, who died by suicide in August 2021, had had her level of care downgraded by Birmingham and Solihull Mental Health Foundation Trust a month earlier, in July, something her family suggested had a “dramatic impact”.
She was moved from a “care programme approach” (known as CPA, which involves enhanced care for people with complex needs and/or safety concerns) to “care support” (a non-clinical programme for people with lower-level concerns and complexities).
An earlier investigation into her death by the trust, finalised in December, said the trust should audit other cases to check whether the trust’s 2019 “care management and CPA/care support policy” was being complied with.
Now Birmingham and Solihull coroner James Bennett has criticised a delay in carrying out the trust-wide audit – writing in a prevention of future deaths report that, as of last month, four months after the report investigating Ms Adams’ care was completed, “no action has been taken”.
Read full story (paywalled)
Source: HSJ, 5 May 2022
Patient Safety Learning

Big rise in delayed GP referrals sparks safety warning

A big rise in GP referrals being deferred because no appointment slots are available, in the wake of the covid pandemic, has sparked concerns that patients are going undiagnosed and missing out on the correct treatment.
Outpatient referrals are typically classed as having an “appointment slot issue” when no booking slot is available within a timeframe specified by the provider, under the NHS e-referral system.
The latest NHS Digital figures, analysed by HSJ, show the number of ASIs was 52% higher in March 2022 than February 2020 — up from 245,582 to 374,209. 
The statistics suggests appointment slot issue accounted for 77% of all bookings in March 2022, 26% of all referrals and 19% of bookings and referrals combined. In February 2020, this was 32%, 17% and 11% respectively.
The Royal College of GPs told HSJ there was a risk of patients “simply disappearing” off lists if the issue was not properly managed, while charity Patient Safety Learning said the issue was a “growing problem” which NHS England must “urgently investigate”.
Patient Safety Learning chief executive Helen Hughes said: “NHS England needs to urgently investigate, quantify the scale of the problem and take action if we are to prevent these capacity problems resulting in avoidable harm for patients.
“Patients who cannot access outpatient services may deteriorate further while they wait for care, and it is not clear that in these cases there is the appropriate support available for them. There is also the potential for patients to be misdiagnosed and receive inappropriate treatment without specialist involvement, and the potential of a postcode lottery of care emerging for some conditions.”
Read full story (paywalled)
Source: HSJ, 6 May 2022
Read Patient Safety Learning's blog: Rejected outpatient referrals are putting patients at risk and increasing workload pressure on GPs
Patient Safety Learning

Standup comedy course for men at risk of suicide wins NHS funding

A course helping some of the most vulnerable people in the country by teaching them to be comedians is proving so successful that it is being socially prescribed by NHS trusts and private practices across the country.
“I’ve taught comedy for 10 years, and students often told me how much stronger, more resilient and happier they were after exploring their personal histories through standup comedy,” said Angie Belcher, founder of Comedy on Referral and comedian-in-residence at Bristol University.
“That inspired me to prove that the models, exercises and games used in a standup comedy course can help people to recover from emotional problems such as mental illness, postnatal depression, PTSD and anxiety disorders,” she said.
After completing a highly successful six-week NHS course for trauma survivors in Bristol, Comedy on Referral has now won NHS funding to help men at risk of suicide in London. Belcher is also in discussions with a private practice to extend the course to young people with autism and ADHD.
“My course for trauma victims encourages them to process their trauma in a different way, so they can change who the victim is and choose the narrative. They can actually go right down into ‘This is what I was thinking and then this thing happened to me’,” said Belcher.
“This enables survivors to consciously use comedy to change their perspective of their experiences, but it also puts them in a physically powerful position because being on stage is very powerful,” she said. “You can speak directly to an audience about important things, which means you have the opportunity to change their lives..."
Read full story
Source: The Guardian, 9 May 2022
Patient Safety Learning

ICS set to miss July two-year waiters target by 860 patients

One of England’s most challenged integrated care systems (ICS) is set to miss by more than 800 patients the government’s target of eliminating two-year elective waits by July. 
Devon ICS currently estimates 860 patients will have waited longer than two years for planned care by July 2022, when all patients waiting longer than two years should have been treated – according to the NHS’s elective recovery plan.
It is the first reported example of an ICS forecasting to miss the high-profile target which government has agreed with NHS England.
The ICS, which is among the health systems with the lowest rating from NHSE, is a national outlier against the target, with around 1,500 patients currently waiting two years or more for care.
The backlog has occurred despite the ICS previously being one of 12 systems given extra money for planned care through the elective accelerator programme and retaining the use of its Nightingale Hospital.
Read full story  (paywalled)
Source: 6 May 2022
Patient Safety Learning

More than 65,000 people are left waiting to find out if it’s cancer each month

New calculations from Cancer Research UK estimate that, on average, over 65,000 people in England are left waiting longer than 28 days to find out whether they have cancer each month.
These estimates are based on the latest data from the Faster Diagnosis Standard (FDS). The FDS is a performance standard introduced by Government in 2021. It’s used to better capture how long people on certain cancer-related referrals wait for a diagnosis.
This applies to people referred by their GP urgently with suspected cancer, following breast symptoms, or have been picked up through cancer screening.
The current FDS target is set at 75%, meaning three quarters of people being urgently referred should be told they have cancer or given the all-clear within that timeframe. However, this target has yet to be met.
In addition, the data has revealed major variation across the country – with only 78 of 143 trusts meeting the 75% target. This means that despite the tireless efforts of NHS staff, chronic capacity issues mean that people continue to be failed by the system.
Michelle Mitchell, our chief executive, said: “As a country we should not be willing to accept that over 1 in 4 people on an urgent referral are left waiting over a month to find out whether they have cancer. Nor should we stand for the variation that exists across the country.”
The charity is calling on Government to include a more ambitious target within its upcoming 10-year cancer plan, to help ensure around 54,300 more people each month receive a diagnosis or have cancer ruled out within a month.
With a robust plan and sustained investment to build a cancer workforce fit for the future, patients will be diagnosed quicker and earlier, which will save more lives.
Read full story
Source: Cancer Research UK, 9 May 2022
Patient Safety Learning

Patients in pain as many struggle to find dental care

People in England are struggling to get dental treatment, as dentists close to new NHS patients, a watchdog says.
Healthwatch England, the NHS body representing patients, said the problem was made worse by the rising cost of living and needed "urgent attention".
It said some people were living in pain, unable to speak or eat properly, because they could not find treatment.
And it warned the poorest were suffering most as they were least able to afford to pay for private dentistry.
Healthwatch England said the issue was creating a two-tier system - dividing the rich and the poor - and called on the government to take action.
"There is now a deepening crisis," said Louise Ansari, of Healthwatch England.
"With millions of households bearing the brunt of the escalating living costs, private treatment is simply not an option - and even NHS charges can be a challenge.
"This needs urgent attention."
Read full story
Source: BBC News, 9 May 2022
Patient Safety Learning

Scottish hospitals inquiry: What is being investigated?

The public inquiry into safety and wellbeing issues at two Scottish hospitals is due to resume Monday. This latest stage will hear evidence on the importance of ventilation systems in infection prevention and control.
The inquiry is being chaired by Lord Brodie QC and is examining issues at the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital (QEUH) in Glasgow, and the Royal Hospital for Children and Young People (RHCYP) and Department of Clinical Neurosciences in Edinburgh.
The RHCYP in Edinburgh was due to open in July 2019 but was delayed after last-minute inspections found safety concerns over its ventilation systems.
The Scottish government then stepped in to prevent the hospital from opening just one day before it was due to accept patients.
The £840m QEUH campus in Glasgow opened in April 2015 and has faced a series of contamination incidents since then, linked to issues with water quality and ventilation systems.
An independent review into the hospital's design published its findings in June 2020.
The report found a "series of problems" with the design and build of the hospital, but no clear evidence to link those failures to any "avoidable deaths".
Jeane Freeman said in June 2020 that the inquiry had been ordered to protect the "safety and well-being of all patients and their families", which the health secretary said should be a "primary consideration" in all NHS construction projects.
Patient Safety Learning

Ukraine refugees in UK face waits of up to two years for war trauma therapy

Traumatised Ukrainian refugees who have sought sanctuary in the UK may have to wait two years before they can get specialised therapy to help them heal from the horrors of war, according to experts.
Therapists who specialise in treating war trauma say they have seen NHS waiting lists of two years before refugees can access the specialist treatment they need.
Services across the UK are patchy with some areas “treatment deserts when it comes to trauma”, according to Emily Palmer-White, a psychotherapist and community manager at the charity Room to Heal, which provides support for people who have fled persecution.
“There are often extremely long waiting lists. I have been told two years. You can’t separate the psychological from the practical – it’s more difficult to help people if they’re preoccupied with survival,” said Palmer-White.
A spokesperson for the Department of Health and Social Care said officials recognised the trauma Ukrainians were facing and stood shoulder-to-shoulder with them. However, beyond having access to NHS care officials did not cite any specific provision to provide newly arrived refugees with trauma support.
Prof Cornelius Catona, of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, said the visa delays of several weeks would likely exacerbate mental illness for those already struggling and that the refugee schemes should have included a mechanism for spotting signs of trauma early.
Viktoriia Liamets, a Ukrainian child and family therapist who recently arrived in the UK after fleeing the war, said Ukrainians arriving in Britain had multiple and complex traumas to contend with.
Read full story
Source: The Guardian, 9 May 2022
Patient Safety Learning

Hepatitis in children mystery still being investigated as cases rise

UK health officials say they are still no clearer on the cause of a rise in liver inflammation, or hepatitis, in children.
A common adenovirus is thought to play a role, but other possibilities are still being investigated.
In the UK, 163 cases have now been identified, and 11 children have received liver transplants.
Cases have been detected in 20 countries worldwide, with nearly 300 children affected, and one death.
"It's important that parents know the likelihood of their child developing hepatitis is extremely low," said Dr Meera Chand, from the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA).
She said parents should still be alert to the signs - particularly jaundice, a yellow tinge in the whites of the eyes - and they should contact a doctor if concerned.
Since last week, another 18 children in the UK with hepatitis have been identified - 118 live in England, 22 in Scotland, 13 in Wales and 10 in Northern Ireland.
The children's most common symptoms were jaundice and vomiting - and most have been under five years old.
Read full story
Source: BBC News, 7 May 2022
Patient Safety Learning

Trusts resist visiting rule after ‘Javid threatens to call CEOs’

Local clinical leaders are continuing to question pressure from government and NHS England to relax Covid-19 visiting restrictions. 
Visitors, and people accompanying patients, have been restricted throughout covid, and in recent months there has been substantial local variation.
Ministers and NHSE, as well as other politicians and some patient groups, have been pressing for more relaxed restrictions for some time and in recent weeks have stepped up their instructions.
National visiting guidance was eased in March, and other infection control guidance, including requiring the isolation of covid contacts, was relaxed last month. Last week, the Daily Telegraph reported health and social care secretary Sajid Javid planned to “name and shame” trusts not implementing the changes, and to call hospital chief executives directly about it.
Meanwhile, chief nursing officer Ruth May reiterated the visiting rules last month, saying on Twitter: “We must not underestimate the important contribution that visiting makes to the wellbeing and personalised care of patients and make it happen.”
However, an NHSE online meeting for clinical leaders on Friday was told that while “a great number of trusts have returned to previous visiting policies… we know there are trusts which haven’t implemented this fully”.
One said: “It is very difficult to safely return to pre-covid visiting as some hospital’s estate can’t safely support visitors in already over-crowded [emergency departments] and increasingly busy [outpatient departments].
“Surely local risk assessment is key and should be supported rather than increasing pressure to simply blanketly return to pre-pandemic arrangements everywhere?”
Read full story (paywalled)
Source: HSJ, 9 May 2022
You may also be interested in:
Visiting restrictions and the impact on patients and their families: a relative's perspective It’s time to rename the ‘visitor’: reflections from a relative  
Patient Safety Learning

Hundreds of mentally ill prisoners denied urgent treatment in England

Hundreds of severely mentally ill prisoners in urgent need of hospital treatment are being left in prison cells due to bed shortages in secure NHS psychiatric units, an investigation has discovered.
Freedom of information (FoI) responses from 22 NHS trusts reveal for the first time that just over half of the 5,403 prisoners in England assessed by prison-based psychiatrists to require hospitalisation were not transferred between 2016 and 2021 – an 81% increase on the number of prisoners denied a transfer in the previous five years.
In some areas, the majority of mentally ill prisoners were not admitted, which could be the result of long delays or a trust refusing to take certain patients. Norfolk and Suffolk NHS foundation trust, which was rated inadequate by the Care Quality Commission last month, only admitted 16 of 41 prisoners referred in 2021. Essex Partnership University NHS foundation trust only admitted 24 of 57 prisoners referred in 2021. Lancashire and South Cumbria NHS foundation trust only accepted 18 of the 38 prisoners referred in 2021.
Peter Dawson, the director of the Prison Reform Trust, said the figures unearthed by the investigation suggested hundreds of very ill people were being denied the treatment they needed.
“It is shocking that a growing number of people are not getting the transfer to hospital that clinicians say is essential for their mental health,” he said. “Instead they are languishing in often overcrowded and dilapidated prisons. It is cruel and guarantees people will leave prison in a worse state than when they came in, with every likelihood that the behaviour that originally led to their arrest and conviction will continue.”
Read full story
Source: The Guardian, 10 May 2022
Patient Safety Learning

Plymouth maternity staff missed chances to save baby’s life, report finds

A baby died after maternity staff repeatedly missed chances to intervene to save his life, an official investigation has found.
Giles Cooper-Hall was just 16 hours old when he died after a catalogue of errors in the maternity care of his mother, Ruth Cooper-Hall, at Derriford hospital in Plymouth.
A Healthcare Safety Investigation Branch (HSIB) report into the incident has exposed how inexperienced and overstretched staff failed to carry out proper checks, recognise there was an emergency or seek help from senior doctors until it was too late.
It comes just weeks after the independent Ockenden report into more than 1,800 cases revealed serious failings in the maternity care provided at Shrewsbury and Telford hospital NHS Trust.
It revealed how Ruth Cooper-Hall, then aged 37, was not personally seen by a consultant when she went into labour in October last year, despite recommendations made in the interim Ockenden report published in December 2020.
The HSIB report also suggested Giles’ death could have been avoided if staff had known about the care plan for his mother’s labour. Instead, vital messages were not passed on, with the investigation finding this was likely to be because the staff responsible were “distracted” by other tasks.
Read full story
Source: The Guardian, 10 May 2022
Patient Safety Learning
Registered address: Patient Safety Learning, China Works SB203, 100 Black Prince Road Vauxhall, London, SE1 7SJ

Account

Navigation

Search

Search

Configure browser push notifications
Chrome (Android)
  1. Tap the lock icon next to the address bar.
  2. Tap Permissions → Notifications.
  3. Adjust your preference.
Chrome (Desktop)
  1. Click the padlock icon in the address bar.
  2. Select Site settings.
  3. Find Notifications and adjust your preference.