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Found 1,330 results
  1. News Article
    NHS leaders across England say staffing gaps and a lack of capacity in social care are putting the care and safety of patients in the NHS at risk. Almost 250 NHS leaders responding to an NHS Confederation survey say that patients are being delayed in hospital much longer than they should, with the knock-on impact resulting in higher demand on A&E departments and longer ambulance response times. More than 9 in 10 NHS leaders warn of a social care workforce crisis in their area which they expect will get worse this winter. Nearly all NHS leaders say the lack of capacity in social care is putting the care and safety of patients at risk. More than four in five warn that the absence of care packages for people to be able to return home or be moved into a care home is the main reason why medically fit patients are stuck in hospital longer than they should be. Almost all NHS leaders say that the most impactful solution would be better pay for social care staff and want the Government to increase investment in social care as a priority. An acute trust executive director in the South West accused the Government of presiding over a “national scandal.” “If the social care capacity shortfall was solved then we would not be holding ambulances at all, we would have almost no problems with elective recovery and our emergency departments would not be crowded and unsafe,” they said. Another acute trust chair in the East of England added: “The result of using nearly 20 per cent of our beds for patients who are medically fit but need packages of care to return home is an overcrowded A&E, twelve-hour trolley waits and much delayed ambulance handover times. The connection is very clear to us…Until we find a solution to social care staffing and funding, the situation can only get worse.” Commenting on the survey results Lord Victor Adebowale, chair of the NHS Confederation, said: “Decades of delay and inertia have left social care services chronically underfunded and in desperate need of more support. “NHS leaders stand alongside their sister services in social care in wanting a rescue package for the sector. They are sounding the alarm and sending a clear message to Government that the social care system has not been ‘fixed’." Read full story Source: NHS Confederation, 28 July 2022
  2. News Article
    Bullying and harassment allegations made against leaders of the organisation that supplies blood to the NHS have prompted a Care Quality Commission (CQC) review, with staff claiming poor culture has exacerbated the crisis around low blood stocks. HSJ has learned whistleblowers at NHS Blood and Transplant raised concerns with the CQC. As a result, the regulator has been carrying out a review of the organisation’s leadership. Several current and former staff, who wished to remain anonymous, told HSJ there are widespread concerns about the organisation’s culture, which they claim has enabled bullying and harassment from senior employees, including some racist behaviours. They said the culture has resulted in a significant number of staff being absent due to stress and anxiety, which alongside the latest wave of coronavirus, has contributed to an ongoing staffing crisis. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 28 July 2022
  3. News Article
    Former Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt has told a public inquiry institutions and the state can sometimes "close ranks around a lie". Giving evidence at the infected-blood inquiry, he said it could be seen as a "huge failing of democracy" that victims had waited so long for justice. At least 5,000 people contracted HIV or hepatitis C in the 1970s and 80s, after being given contaminated blood products and transfusions on the NHS. More than 2,400 have died as a result. Jenni Richards QC asked whether a 2012 briefing for new ministers in the health department - "almost certainly" not shown to Mr Hunt at the time - stating, under a heading "Key facts", hepatitis C and HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus) infection had been a problem in the 1970s and 80s, "before it was possible to screen donors and make products safer", suggested the contamination had been an "unavoidable problem". Mr Hunt, health secretary for six years until July 2018, replied: "I mean, that briefing is wrong and it shouldn't say that. "At the very least, ministers should be aware as politicians that this is contentious and disputed by families - but I'm afraid it tries to suggest the issue is closed when it is not." Read full story Source: BBC News, 27 July 2022
  4. News Article
    Whistleblowing is still not ‘business as usual’ and leaders must take action after an unusual drop in the proportion of staff viewing their organisation as having a positive speak up culture, the national guardian for freedom to speak up has said. Speaking to HSJ, Jayne Chidgey-Clark highlighted some “really concerning” findings from the National Guardian’s Office’s most recent survey, both about speak up culture and the wellbeing of the freedom to speak up guardians. The NGO survey found a 10 percentage point drop in freedom to speak up guardians agreeing senior leaders supported workers to speak up, dropping from around 80% to 70% between 2020 and 2021. She also highlighted an increase in FTSU guardians reporting staff had experienced “detriment” for speaking up within their organisation. Ms Chidgey-Clark, a nurse by background who took up the role last December, said it was the first time the National Guardian’s Office had seen a drop on this question since the survey began in 2017, and that it also “chimed” with the latest NHS staff survey. She added: “Workers are saying the same thing, and that’s really concerning. And it will be even more concerning if we see a similar trend next year. It’s almost like an early warning sign to leaders." Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 28 July 2022
  5. News Article
    The new health and social care secretary has asked officials to hastily organise several “hackathons” to try to address the crisis in ambulance performance. The first, which was instigated just last week, will take place tomorrow (28 July), and a second is planned for August, sources told HSJ. Messages from officials described the work as a “request from our new secretary of state” and explained the short notice by saying he was “pushing… quite strongly for something before the end of the month”. The aim is said to be to examine what is driving poor performance, and the Department of Health and Social Care is “particularly interested in understanding which factors reduce risk to patients”, according to one message seen by HSJ. Hackathons are short, time-limited collaborative design events, typically involving computer programmers and data scientists or analysts, which aim to result in working software or product on the chosen theme by the end. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 27 July 2022
  6. News Article
    The NHS has broken its “fundamental promise” to the public that life-saving emergency care will be available when they need it, a top NHS doctor has said, as ambulances continue to lose tens of thousands of hours waiting outside hospitals. Katherine Henderson, the president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, said that what she described as the fundamental promise of the NHS to provide an ambulance in a real emergency has been “broken”. Her comments come as the West Midlands Ambulance Service (WMAS) University NHS Trust predicted it would lose 48,000 ambulance hours waiting outside A&E departments in July. This would make it the worst month on record. In papers published on Thursday, WMAS said the impact of handover delays means that patients are waiting longer than needed for an emergency response, including patients in category one, which includes those needing immediate life-saving care. It added: “This means that patients who are immediately time-critical medical emergencies do not get the response they need and may suffer significant harm or death.” Read full story Source: The Independent, 26 July 2022
  7. News Article
    NHS England and local leaders must urgently develop a coherent ‘operating model’ for the era of integrated care systems (ICS) or see the reforms fail, leading trust chief executives have told HSJ. Despite ICSs formally launching on 1 July, the chiefs said there was still no clarity about how the service would be supported and held to account as the Health and Care Act reforms are rolled out and the stuttering Covid recovery continues. The CEOs were speaking at a roundtable to mark the publication of HSJ's annual ranking of the NHS’s “top 50 trust chief executives”. NHSE has been working on a new operating model since last year. It has confirmed it plans to keep its seven separate regional teams, and has recently indicated national programmes will be curbed as part of reductions to central staffing. Caroline Clarke, the chief executive of north London’s Royal Free group of trusts, said: “What’s unclear to me is, what the operating model is for [the] whole NHS? What is NHSE going to do… what’s expected of the regions and the ICSs… is the performance management line [for providers] going to go all the way through the ICS?” Ms Clarke said she recognised “some kind of regional infrastructure” was needed and that the existing set-up made sense in widely recognised areas such as London and other “urban” conurbations. But she added: “Are [regions] just going to be aggregating features of the NHS, or are they actually going to have a kind of intent to them?” Ms Clarke said she was “hung up” on getting an effective operating model because, without it, there was an increased chance NHSE staff would “get in the way and stop us making decisions”. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 25 July 2022
  8. News Article
    A lack of accountability is causing the quality of NHS services to crumble, according to some of the most respected trust chief executives. They said the problem arose from four factors: the lack of an operating model for how NHS England should oversee the service, confusion over what integrated care systems should be responsible for, the lack of clarity on which standards providers should be seeking to meet, and trust leaders not holding each other to account. The views were expressed at a roundtable to mark the publication of HSJ’s annual ranking of the NHS’s “top 50 trust chief executives”. The most strongly worded contribution came from Milton Keynes University Hospital Foundation Trust chief executive Joe Harrison. He told the roundtable: “I’m really concerned about where we are at as an NHS. I think we’re in danger of all sitting around the campfire singing ‘kumbaya’ as the Titanic sinks. “We are presiding over a failing NHS. There’s no question about it. And if we carry on like this, people have every right to say, ‘what on earth are we spending £150bn on?’” Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 25 July 2022
  9. News Article
    A quarter of Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) non-executive directors of NHS trusts have seen or experienced discrimination in the course of their work, a report reveals. While almost four out of five (79%) of these BAME non-executives said they challenged such behaviour when they encountered it, only half (50%) said that led to a change of policy or behaviour. The other half felt they had been ‘fobbed off’ or subjected to actively hostile behaviour for having spoken up,” says a report commissioned by the Seacole Group, which represents most of the BAME non-executive board members of NHS trusts in England. It adds: “This level of discrimination is unacceptable anywhere and even more so in the boardrooms of NHS organisations. Too many Black, Asian and other ethnic NEDs (non-executive directors) are being subjected to it and left to deal with it on their own.” Read full story Source: The Guardian, 21 July 2022
  10. News Article
    NHS leaders have sometimes been “shouting into the void” about their fears of the health service being overwhelmed by Covid because of the absence of a single national command centre for the pandemic response, a new report argues. The Tony Blair Institute for Global Change has published a report which recommends short and long term actions for dealing with Covid and future health emergencies. It says the government should have previously, and should now, set up “a national centre for response” to have overriding national responsibility for managing Covid and future crises. The government should also shift away from traditional methods of communication, to instead listen to “communities… beliefs and fears” about Covid, and adjust messages to respond to these. The report has been authored by the institute’s head of health Henry Dowlen, who was seconded to work on several pandemic projects such as a setting up a Nightingale Hospital and coordinating regional and national response work. He said that if government did not change course then the NHS, along with other services and parts of society, would remain in a “vicious cycle” of operational problems. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 20 July 2022
  11. News Article
    Women and girls across England will benefit from improved healthcare following the publication of the first ever government-led Women’s Health Strategy for England today. Following a call for evidence which generated almost 100,000 responses from individuals across England, and building on 'Our Vision for Women’s Health', the strategy sets bold ambitions to tackle deep-rooted, systemic issues within the health and care system to improve the health and wellbeing of women, and reset how the health and care system listens to women. The strategy includes key commitments around: New research and data gathering. The expansion of women’s health-focused education and training for incoming doctors. Improvements to fertility services. Ensuring women have access to high-quality health information. Updating guidance for female-specific health conditions like endometriosis to ensure the latest evidence and advice is being used in treatment. To support progress already underway in these areas, the strategy aims to: Provide a new investment of £10 million for a breast screening programme, which will provide 25 new mobile breast screening units to be targeted at areas with the greatest challenges in uptake and coverage. This will: - provide extra capacity for services to recover from the impact of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic - boost uptake of screening in areas where attendance is low - tackle health disparities - contribute towards higher early diagnosis rates in line with the NHS Long Term Plan. Remove additional barriers to IVF for female same-sex couples. There will no longer be a requirement for them to pay for artificial insemination to prove their fertility status and NHS treatment for female same-sex couples will start with 6 cycles of artificial insemination, prior to accessing IVF services, if necessary. Improve transparency on provision and availability of IVF so prospective parents can see how their local area performs to tackle the ‘postcode lottery’ in access to IVF treatment Recognise parents who have lost a child before 24 weeks through the introduction of a pregnancy loss certificate in England. Ensure specialist endometriosis services have the most up-to-date evidence and advice by updating the service specification for severe endometriosis, which defines the standards of care patients can expect. This sits alongside the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) review of its guideline on endometriosis. Read full story Source: Gov.UK, 20 July 2022
  12. News Article
    Doctors’ leaders have reacted with incredulity to demands that all hospitals in England take “immediate steps” to find extra space for patients so that no ambulance waits longer than 30 minutes. A letter from NHS England sent to the heads of NHS trusts, integrated care boards, and ambulance trusts acknowledged that this will not be easy “and that it may place additional burden on staff at an already challenging time. The letter was sent on 15 July, in response to the increased pressure on ambulance services over the past year and in light of the current heatwave. It said, “All systems that are currently unable to offload ambulances within 30 minutes should now take further steps to create capacity within acute hospitals to ensure the rapid release of vehicles. This will require risk based decisions to be made about both the use of estate and deployment of clinical workforce.” Vishal Sharma, chair of the consultants committee at the BMA, said, “The government should be ashamed that it has come to this. If hospitals had the space or the staff to allow them to care for these patients, they wouldn’t be waiting in ambulances at the hospital door in the first place. The sad fact is that after decades of underinvestment, our hospitals are under-resourced, under-bedded, and understaffed.” Read full story Source: BMJ, 18 July 2022
  13. News Article
    A health minister incorrectly told the Commons yesterday “we have procured a contract” for surge support for ambulance services, despite the contract not having been awarded yet, HSJ has learned. There are also doubts about two other points made by health minister Maria Caulfield in Parliament yesterday in a debate about the current high pressure on ambulance services. She said: “We have procured a contract with a total value of £30m for an auxiliary ambulance service, which will provide national surge capacity if needed to support the ambulance response during periods of increased pressure. That capacity is there, should we need it.” However, NHS England, which advertised the contract in May, confirmed to HSJ today that it “is yet to be awarded”. Ms Caulfield was responding to an urgent question from Labour shadow health and social care secretary Wes Streeting about pressure on ambulance services and the heatwave. HSJ reported on Tuesday that all 10 major ambulance services in England were on the highest level of alert. Read full story (paywalled) Source: 14 July 2022
  14. News Article
    A cross-party group of MPs and peers have written to the health secretary requesting an “urgent” meeting to discuss “unregulated” and “untested” treatments that are being offered to Long Covid patients in the UK. It comes after The Independent uncovered a wide range of unproven and “dangerous” therapies being touted to patients, few of which have been approved for use in the NHS – or rigorously tested – for alleviating persistent coronavirus symptoms. Patients with Long Covid are also travelling abroad to clinics in Europe to receive treatments such as “blood washing”, often at a cost of tens of thousands of pounds, according to an ITV and BMJ investigation. In a letter to health secretary Steve Barclay, the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Coronavirus expressed concern that patients “desperately” awaiting treatment through the NHS are being exploited by private clinics, and urged the government to launch an investigation into the provision of unproven care. The group wrote: “It has come to the attention of the APPG that a number of unregulated long Covid clinics are operating in the UK, offering untested and unscientific treatments to people living with long Covid. “The evidence our parliamentary group has heard makes it clear that in some parts of the country the current NHS long Covid care pathways are unfit for purpose, with access to NHS long Covid clinics being described as a ‘postcode lottery’.” Read full story Source: The Independent, 14 July 2022
  15. News Article
    A couple whose baby died in Nottingham say they are "furious" at a memo to hospital staff criticising media coverage of the city's maternity units. Jack and Sarah Hawkins, whose daughter Harriet died in 2016, have led calls for an inquiry into failings. Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust (NUH) is at the centre of a review into failings at the city's maternity units. After years of campaigning and an earlier review which was abandoned, experienced midwife Ms Ockenden was appointed in May. On Tuesday it emerged Ms Wallis had sent a memo to NUH maternity staff which read: "Yesterday, (Monday 11th) Donna Ockenden met with families as part of the new independent review process. "Some of you will no doubt have seen some of the media fall out." "Yet again they painted a damning picture of our maternity services, leaving out of their reports the great work that has been done, the improvements that have been introduced and the passion and commitment of all of the staff." Mr and Mrs Hawkins told the Local Democracy Reporting Service: "It's not just the families and the press ganging up - there is very real concern about safety. For senior leadership to not be saying that they have a problem is beyond us." Hospital bosses have "wholeheartedly apologised" for offence caused. Read full story Source: BBC News, 13 July 2022
  16. News Article
    The Health and Social Care Secretary Steve Barclay has today appointed Dr Henrietta Hughes OBE as the first ever Patient Safety Commissioner for England. Adding to and enhancing existing work to improve the safety of medicines and medical devices, the appointment of a Commissioner is in response to the recommendations from Baroness Cumberlege’s review into patient safety, published in 2020. Dr Hughes will be an independent point of contact for patients, giving a voice to their concerns to make sure they are heard. She will help the NHS and government better understand what they can do to put patients first, promote the safety of patients, and the importance of the views of patients and other members of the public. Health and Social Care Secretary Steve Barclay said: "It is essential that we put patient safety first and continue to listen to and champion patients’ voices. Dr Henrietta Hughes brings a wealth of experience with her as the first ever Patient Safety Commissioner to improve the safety of medicines and medical devices and her work will help support NHS staff as we work hard to beat the Covid backlogs." Patient Safety Commissioner Henrietta Hughes said: "I am humbled and honoured to be appointed as the first Patient Safety Commissioner. This vital role, recommended in First Do No Harm, will make a difference to the safety of patients in relation to medicines and medical devices. Patients’ voices need to be at the heart of the design and delivery of healthcare. I would like to pay tribute to the incredible courage, persistence and compassion of all those who gave evidence to the report, their families and everyone who continues to campaign tirelessly for safer treatments. I will work collaboratively with patients, the healthcare system and others so that all patients receive the information they need, all patients’ voices are heard and the system responds quickly to keep people safe." Read full story Source: Gov.UK, 12 July 2022
  17. News Article
    The NHS's approach to tackling children’s mental health is “threatening to overwhelm the social care system”, the president of the Association of Directors of Children’s Services has warned. Steve Crocker believes the NHS is “not doing a very good job” for children, describing how children are typically now waiting four months for a mental health assessment and over a year for treatment as being “simply not good enough”. He admitted he was being “deliberately provocative” around children’s mental health at the opening of the ADCS conference yesterday, as he wants to see “more collaboration” from the new Integrated Care Systems (ICSs), which were put on a statutory footing this month. Mr Crocker warned delegates that under the ICS reforms, there is an “ongoing risk that the needs of children are sidelined by the ongoing pressure in acute adult services”. “The House of Lords amendment ensuring each ICS has a children’s strategic lead was a welcome development, but does it go far enough?” he asked. Mr Crocker told LGC: “Children's mental health should be a priority for every ICS in the country. I can't imagine any reason why any ICS would not do that." Read full story Source: Local Government Chronicle, 8 July 2022
  18. News Article
    Hospital leaders say they have been pressured to deliver more ‘corridor care’ as a result of efforts to ease the ambulance handover crisis. Due to the collapse in ambulance response times over the last year, hospitals have been told to receive patients from ambulance crews more quickly, to enable those crews to respond to new incidents in the community. This can mean patients being kept on trolley beds in corridors, with a lack of appropriate staff to care for them. Tracy Bullock, chief executive of University Hospitals of North Midlands, told HSJ her trust almost eradicated “corridor care” before the pandemic. But she added: “There have been discussions about going back to corridor care, but we have resisted that, as it brought significant patient safety and staff wellbeing issues… although these never received the same airtime as ambulance waits as they are unseen and only impact on the acutes. “The terminology has now changed and instead of corridor care it’s ‘cohorting’, and the space is not necessarily a corridor but a designated space for ambulances to drop more patients off.” She said this only works with enough staff, “otherwise you end up with the same safety issues that we had delivering corridor care pre-pandemic”. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 11 July 2022
  19. News Article
    Steve Barclay has been named as the new health secretary following the resignation of Sajid Javid, who stepped down after saying he had lost faith in Boris Johnson's leadership. He starts as secretary of state at a time when the NHS and social care in England are under serious pressure. Amanda Pritchard, the head of NHS England, has warned that the next two years could be even tougher for the health service than the two years since the start of the pandemic. NHS Providers, which represents hospitals and other NHS trusts, described the problems Mr Barclay faces on his first day in the job as "big and pressing". At the very top of that list is a record backlog for planned operations. Read full story Source: BBC News, 6 July 2022
  20. News Article
    Sajid Javid has resigned and been replaced by Steve Barclay as health and social care secretary. Mr Barclay, previously chief of staff to the prime minister, was reported as having been given the role on Tuesday evening. Mr Barclay said: “It is an honour to take up the position of Health and Social Care Secretary. Our NHS and social care staff have showed us time and again - throughout the pandemic and beyond - what it means to work with compassion and dedication to transform lives. This government is investing more than ever before in our NHS and care services to beat the Covid backlogs, recruit 50,000 more nurses, reform social care and ensure patients across the country can access the care they need.” Mr Barclay’s appointment came hours after Mr Javid — health secretary since June last year — announced his resignation, saying in a letter to Boris Johnson that he “can no longer, in good conscience, continue serving in this government” and that Mr Johnson has lost his confidence. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 6 July 2022
  21. News Article
    The outgoing chief investigator of the national safety watchdog has described his frustration with the organisation’s ‘ambivalent’ relationship with NHS England. Keith Conradi, who is due to retire from the Health Safety Investigation Branch in July, said he did not think he had “ever really spoken to any of the hierarchy in NHS England”. He added “their priorities are elsewhere”. In an interview with health commentator Roy Lilley for the Institute for Health and Social Care Management, Mr Conradi also described HSIB’s relationship with NHSE as “ambivalent”. “It wobbled along that sort of line and got worse as time has gone on,” he said. “At the very start I had a chat with the permanent secretary of the Department of Health and said we would be better off in the department than NHS England. He disagreed and felt that we’d be too close to [then health secretary] Jeremy Hunt, and particularly at that time that would have a negative effect.” Mr Conradi was also critical of the decision to ask HSIB to take on investigations into maternity care early in its life. He said he was “shocked” that it happened so quickly “when we hadn’t really got going”. He continued: “We hadn’t developed a method of doing normal national investigations and suddenly we were being asked to do maternity ones. There was a huge amount of pressure to do this.” Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 28 June 2022
  22. News Article
    A drive to ‘transform’ access to urgent, emergency and planned care will be added to the goals of the NHS long-term plan, a document leaked to HSJ has revealed The long-term plan for the NHS was originally published in January 2019. Last September, NHS England said it was reviewing the commitments made within the plan, with senior officials warning that many of them could not be met after the damage of the pandemic. HSJ has seen a document prepared for the most recent meeting of the NHS Assembly which sets out NHSE’s approach to the refresh. Strategic developments expected include better joined-up community based and preventive care, transform access to urgent, emergency and planned care, improve care quality and operations, and tackle health inequalities, improve population health and develop a sustainable health service through greater collaboration. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 24 June 2022
  23. News Article
    An ambulance trust has been placed in special measures after the Care Quality Commission (CQC) rated its leadership ‘inadequate’ and said staff felt unable to raise concerns without fear of reprisal The CQC inspected South East Coast Ambulance Service Foundation Trust after being contacted by staff with concerns about bullying and harassment, inappropriate sexualised behaviour and a leadership team which failed to address concerns. Many of the concerns echo those raised in 2017 in an independent review into a “culture of fear” at the trust, shortly after it was first placed in regulatory special measures. It was taken out in 2019 but has now been placed back in the equivalent “recovery support programme” on the CQC’s recommendation. CQC director of integrated care Amanda Williams praised staff who had contacted the regulator. She said: “While staff were doing their very best to provide safe care to patients, leaders often appeared out of touch with what was happening on the front line and weren’t always aware of the challenges staff faced. Staff described feeling unable to raise concerns without fear of reprisal – and when concerns were raised, these were not acted on. “This meant that some negative aspects of the organisational culture, including bullying and harassment and inappropriate sexualised behaviour, were not addressed and became normalised behaviours." Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 22 June 2022
  24. News Article
    Systems and processes in place around patient safety failed in terms of the work of a Belfast-based neurologist, an inquiry has found. Dr Michael Watt was at the centre of Northern Ireland’s largest ever recall of patients, which began in 2018, after concerns were raised about his clinical work. More than 4,000 of his former patients attended recall appointments. Almost a fifth of patients who attended recall appointments were found to have received an “insecure diagnosis”. The final report following the Independent Neurology Inquiry found that problems with Dr Watt’s practice were missed for years and opportunities to intervene were lost. It makes 76 recommendations to the Department of Health, healthcare organisations, General Medical Council and the independent sector. “While one process or system failure may not be critical, the synergistic effect of numerous failures ensured that a problem with an individual doctor’s practice was missed for many years and, as this inquiry finds, opportunities to intervene, particularly in 2006/2007, 2012/2013, and earlier in 2016 were lost,” the inquiry found. Read full story Source: The Independent, 21 June 2022
  25. News Article
    Henrietta Hughes has been named as the government’s preferred candidate for the role of Patient Safety Commissioner. Sajid Javid, the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, has today, 20 June 2022, invited the Health and Social Care Committee to hold a pre-appointment scrutiny hearing with Henrietta. Henrietta is a practising GP with a background in women’s health who was the National Guardian for the NHS until 2021. In addition to her clinical work, she is an appraiser for NHS England and Chair of Childhood First. She was selected following an open public appointment process to appoint the first Patient Safety Commissioner. Following the select committee hearing, the committee will set out its views on the candidate’s suitability for the role. The Secretary of State will then consider the committee’s report before making a final decision on the appointment. Source: Gov.UK, 20 June 2022
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