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Showing results for tags 'Organisation / service factors'.
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Content ArticlePeter had a long history of depression, anxiety, and reported suicide attempts. He had acknowledged his reluctance to always engage fully with the treatment offered. On 3 August 2022 he was referred to the home treatment team for crisis intervention. After poor engagement he was transferred back to the community mental health team. On the 14 October he was detained by police under section 136 mental health act after expressing suicidal ideation. He told a psychiatric liaison service nurse he had no ongoing suicidal ideation and was referred to the community mental health team and his GP. He then contacted services further a number of times. On 10 November 2022 Peter was found deceased in his flat having taken a deliberate overdose of his prescribed medication. At the time of his death he was on the waiting list to be allocated a mental health care co-ordinator and there had been no multi-disciplinary meeting with all teams involved to agree how best to work with Peter. His cause of death was confirmed at post-mortem: 1a Carbamazepine toxicity. The conclusion reached was death was a consequence of suicide.
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News Article
Minister: There’s systemic racism in the NHS
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
A health and social care minister privately said there was ‘systemic’ racism within the NHS and called for an investigation into it. Helen Whately told Matt Hancock of her belief in a private message which was today shown to the covid public inquiry. An inquiry hearing with Mr Hancock – who said he agreed with the point – was shown an exchange between Ms Whately, then care minister, and Mr Hancock in June 2020. The Guardian had reported the previous day that an internal report had found systemic racism at NHS Blood and Transplant. Ms Whately, who is now minister of state covering social care and urgent and emergency services, said: “I think the Bame next steps proposed are important but don’t go far enough. There’s systemic racism in some parts of the NHS, as seen in NHSBT.” She added: “Now could be a good moment to kick off a proper piece of work to investigate and tackle it.” Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 1 December 2023- Posted
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- Race
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Content ArticleOn 22 November 2022, NHS England North West wrote to Greater Manchester Mental Health NHS FT (GMMH), to inform the trust it would be commissioning an Independent Review into the failings within the Trust’s services, reported at the Edenfield Centre, and the failure within the organisation to escalate concerns and mitigate against patient harm. This followed concerns raised by patients, their families, and staff, some of which were presented through the media. The intention is that the review’s work will bring some clarity and reassurance to patients, their families, and staff, as well as the broader public, in respect of the ongoing safety of services that the Trust delivers. NHS England has asked Professor Oliver Shanley OBE to lead the Independent Review, as the Independent Chair.
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Content ArticleIn this episode of the King's Fund podcast, Ruth Robertson explores how the NHS elective care waiting list can be managed in a way that improves health equity with Dr Mark Ratnarajah, UK Managing Director at C2-Ai, Sharon Brennan, Director of Policy and External Affairs at National Voices and Dr Polly Mitchell, Post Doctoral Research Fellow in Bioethics and Public Policy at King’s College London.
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- Health inequalities
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News Article
Health secretary told to intervene over ‘systemic’ ambulance deaths
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Ministers must intervene over systemic failures which are “too big for hospital or ambulance trusts to fix on their own” and have led to multiple preventable deaths, a senior coroner has warned. In a move usually considered rare for such an official, Cornwall and Isles of Scilly coroner Andrew Cox has written to the Department of Health and Social Care a second time over ongoing delays to ambulance responses and long ambulance handovers in the area. Last year he warned the NHS was “broken” after he ruled ambulance and emergency care delays contributed to the deaths of four people. Now, he has sent a similar report on the same types of failings in the deaths of John Seagrove, Pauline Humphris, and Patricia Steggles at Royal Cornwall Hospital to new health secretary Victoria Atkins. Mr Cox wrote: “I set out in my [prevention of future death report] last year my understanding of the reasons for the difficulties that are continuing in the Cornwall & Isles of Scilly coroner area. I do not believe those reasons will have changed significantly. ”The challenges are systemic in nature. They are too big for a single doctor, nurse or paramedic to fix. They are too big for either the hospital trust or the ambulance trust to fix on their own.” Read full story Source: HSJ, 1 December 2023- Posted
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Content ArticleThis report explores why capital investment is key to boosting productivity and transforming long-term care.
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News Article
Trust leaders raise alarm over ‘mad’ approach to scrutiny of maternity services
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
The management of fragile maternity services is being hamstrung by a lack of clear standards and direction from government and regulators, trust chairs and chief executives have told HSJ. Kathy Thomson, the retiring chief executive of Liverpool Women’s Foundation Trust, told HSJ that a major overhaul of regulation and oversight of maternity care was needed. She warned that trust leaders were confused about what was expected of their stewardship of maternity services. Much of the increased scrutiny of the sector was coming from people with little knowledge and experience of maternity care, and maternity was beset by too many initiatives which “somebody thinks are a nice thing to do”. Ms Thomson’s comments were echoed by a wide range of other NHS leaders (see ’damaging confidence’ below). Ms Thomson told HSJ: “How clear are we nationally about the real ask of maternity services? Are we going to say it’s the ten NHS Resolution (NHSR) safety standards, which are really tough to achieve and which we agonise over? Or is it the CQC standards, because they will often take a different view around very similar issues? “We’ve had that this year after we’ve been assessed as compliant by NHSR, but then had to re-provide evidence after we’ve been criticised by the CQC for something… and then NHSR have written back to say we’re still fully compliant. “So, should you put your time and energy into the NHSR standards, or do you spend the time on the more subjective drivers? Because we can’t keep doing all of it and having different parts of the NHS saying this is what you need to do or expecting something different.” Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 30 November 2023- Posted
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- Organisation / service factors
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Content ArticleThe first 14 minutes of this programme are focused on a Newsnight investigation into allegations of cover-up, avoidable harm and patient deaths relating to University Hospitals Sussex NHS Foundation Trust. At the time of broadcast, Sussex Police were investigating 105 claims of alleged medical negligence at the Trust.
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News ArticleThe number of people with norovirus in hospital in England is 179% higher than the average at this time of year, official data shows, as the NHS comes under mounting winter pressure. Admissions caused by the vomiting and diarrhoea-causing norovirus have surged and cases of other seasonal viruses are also rising, according to NHS England figures. Health chiefs said the impact on hospitals from seasonal viruses was likely to be worsened by the current cold weather. “We all know somebody who has had some kind of nasty winter virus in the last few weeks,” said Sir Stephen Powis, NHS England’s medical director. “Today’s data shows this is starting to trickle through to hospital admissions, with a much higher volume of norovirus cases compared to last year, and the continued impact of infections like flu and RSV in children on hospital capacity – all likely to be exacerbated by this week’s cold weather.” Read full story Source: The Guardian, 30 November 2023
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News Article
NHS budgets must double to ensure buildings are fit for care
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
According to analysis from the NHS Confederation, capital budgets within the NHS must double to ensure that the delivery of faster and more productive patient care can be supported. Published yesterday, the Investing to Save: The Capital Requirement for a More Sustainable NHS in England report has outlined that a further £6.4 billion of capital funding must be committed through all three years of the next Spending Review so that the NHS’ maintenance backlog can be addressed. This will also help with the refurbishment of dilapidated buildings, the upgrading of equipment, and the increasing of staff productivity. Chief Executive of the NHS Confederation, Matthew Taylor, said: “Some of our members have parts of their estate that are barely fit for the 19th century, let alone the 21st, so any future Secretary of State for Health and Social Care must make the physical and digital condition of the NHS a priority if the health service is to reduce backlogs and get productivity levels to where the government want them to be. “Lack of capital across different care settings, covering digital and physical infrastructure and mental and physical health, is clearly not just leading to missed opportunities to improve productivity, but actively undermining it and causing patient safety issues. Health leaders across England have endless ideas about how capital funding could drive large productivity increases. “Equipping staff with the right tools, and allowing them to operate in safe, modern, optimised environments will improve efficiency, meaning that an increase to the capital budget will help limit the need for growth in revenue spend, relieve pressure on wider NHS finances and services, and put the NHS on the path to longer-term financial sustainability. “This will require a significant increase to the NHS capital budget to make up for years of under-resourcing and repeated raids on capital that has left much of the estate broken. Based on the assessment of health leaders, this will need to be an increase of £6.4 billion to take the capital budget to £14.1 billion for each year of the next spending review in order to fully address the repairs backlog and realise some of the innovative transformation projects which have previously fallen by the wayside. The next government must grasp the nettle.” Read full story Source: National Health Executive, 29 November 2023- Posted
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- Funding
- Infrastructure / building / equipment
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News Article
David Fuller: NHS failures enabled killer to abuse bodies
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Mortuary abuser David Fuller was able to offend without being caught because of "serious failings" at the hospitals where he worked, an inquiry has found. Between 2007 and 2020, Fuller abused the bodies of at least 101 women and girls in Kent hospitals. Inquiry chair Sir Jonathan Michael said "there were missed opportunities to question Fuller's working practices". He added the abuse "had caused shock and horror across our country and beyond". The inquiry has made 17 recommendations to prevent "similar atrocities". Read full story Source: BBC News, 28 November 2023- Posted
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- Criminal behaviour
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Content ArticleThis is the phase 1 report by the independent inquiry into the issues raised by the David Fuller case. The inquiry has been established to investigate how David Fuller was able to carry out inappropriate and unlawful actions in the mortuary of Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells NHS Trust and why they went apparently unnoticed, for so long. A phase 2 report, looking at the broader national picture and the practices and procedures in place to protect the deceased in the NHS and other settings, is planned for publication at a later date.
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News Article
Parents 'destroyed' after baby's death at Royal Sussex County Hospital
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Parents of a two-day-old girl who died in hospital after an emergency C-section are calling for a national inquiry into maternity services. Abigail Fowler Miller died at Brighton's Royal Sussex County Hospital (RSCH), in January last year. On 21 January 2022, Mr Miller and Katie Fowler contacted the hospital's maternity assessment unit four times during the day. Their first phone call was to inform the maternity assessment unit Ms Fowler was in labour, then to report bleeding, and finally to tell them she had become faint and short of breath. According to the Health Safety Investigation Branch's (HSIB) report, staff recorded that Ms Fowler sounded "distressed" in the fourth phone call to the unit, and she thought she was having a panic attack. Staff said she could not answer questions in the fourth phone call because of her "distressed state" and she was asked to come into the hospital. Ms Fowler went into cardiac arrest on the journey in a taxi due to a uterine rupture. An inquest last week found her life would have been prolonged if her mother had been admitted to hospital sooner. In October, families whose babies have died or been harmed in the care of the NHS called for a statutory public inquiry into England's maternity services. Robert Miller, Abigail's father, told BBC Newsnight: "A national inquiry is the only way forward - we cannot continue to treat every incident as a separate tragedy." Read full story Source: BBC News, 28 November 2023- Posted
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- Patient death
- Baby
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Content ArticleDelayed discharges from hospital are a widespread and longstanding problem that can have a significant impact on both patients’ recovery and the efficiency and effectiveness of health and care services. In England, it has become normal practice for government to provide additional one-off funding to reduce delays every winter, as the problem is particularly acute during the colder months.
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News Article
Scandal of healthy mental health patients trapped in hospitals for years
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Mental health patients have been left languishing in hospitals for years due to a chronic shortage in community care, as the number of people trapped on wards hits a record high, The Independent can reveal. Analysis shows 3,213 patients were stuck on units for more than three months last year, including 325 children kept in adult units. Of those a “deeply concerning” number have been deemed well enough to leave but have nowhere to go. One of these cases was Ben Craig, 31, who says he was left “scarred” after being stranded on a ward for two years – despite being fit enough to leave – because two councils fought over who should pay for his supported housing. He missed his daughter's birth and didn’t meet her until she was 18 months old while waiting to be discharged, which only exacerbated his depression. He told The Independent: “I was promised I was going to be moving on, but it just seemed like it went on forever.” Saffron Cordery, deputy chief executive for NHS Providers, which represents hospitals, told The Independent mental health patients stuck in hospitals were experiencing “personal distress” and getting ill again while they wait. She called on the government to put mental health on an “equal foot” to physical care and said not doing so suggested the government was content not to treat all patients equally. Read full story Source: The Independent, 27 November 2023- Posted
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- Mental health
- Organisation / service factors
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News Article
NHS care delays in England harmed 8,000 people and caused 112 deaths last year
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Almost 8,000 people were harmed and 112 died last year as a direct result of enduring long waits for an ambulance or surgery, prompting warnings that NHS care delays are “a disaster”. The fatalities included a man who died of a cardiac arrest after waiting 18 minutes for his 999 call to be answered by the ambulance service and was dead by the time the crew arrived. The figures are the first time NHS England has disclosed how often doctors and nurses file a patient safety report after someone suffers harm while waiting for help. They show that patient deaths arising directly from care delays have risen more than fivefold over the last three years, from 21 in 2019 to 112 last year, as the NHS has come under huge strain. The number of people who came to “severe harm” has also jumped from 96 to 152 during that period. “These data are alarming and show quite clearly the human impact the crisis in the NHS is having on individual patients,” said Rachel Power, the chief executive of the Patients Association. “We have been watching a disaster unfolding across the NHS and have repeatedly warned about the threat to patient safety because of it.” Read full story Source: The Guardian, 27 November 2023- Posted
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- Patient harmed
- Long waiting list
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Content ArticleProductivity is misunderstood at every level in the NHS, not least because the leadership so often use the word to mean something entirely different. So what is it and what are the big misunderstandings about it? In his LinkedIn post, Stephen Black discusses what productivity is and what misunderstandings are feeding the problem.
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News Article
Chaotic communication by NHS in England ‘causing treatment delays’
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Chaotic communication by the NHS in England is causing harmful delays to treatment and endangering patient health, according to research. Widespread communication problems that leave patients and staff scrambling to find their referrals, missing appointments, or receiving late diagnoses have been uncovered in a study by the Demos thinktank, the Patients Association, and the PMA, a professional membership body for healthcare workers. In a poll of 2,000 members of the public and NHS staff across England in October, more than half said they had experienced poor communication from the health service in the past five years, with one in 10 saying their care had been affected as a result. The research also found that over the last year, 18% had their care, or the care of an immediate family member, delayed or affected because they were referred to the wrong service, while 26% said they or a close family member had been inconvenienced because they were given the date and time of an appointment without enough notice. Miriam Levin, the director of participatory programmes at Demos, said that despite the great esteem and pride in the NHS, patients found navigating the system frustrating and stressful. “We heard countless stories of critical appointments missed, diagnoses not shared or shared too late, and referrals for treatment that went missing. This leads to real harm,” she said. Read full story Source: The Guardian, 27 November 2023- Posted
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- Communication problems
- Treatment
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Content ArticleHospital and health system CEOs have a lot of issues dominating their thoughts, including questions about navigating financial, operational and workforce challenges in the industry. Some of these problems may not have an obvious or immediate solution, leaving leaders with unanswered questions. To gain more insight into executives' top concerns, Becker's asked hospital and health system leaders to share the questions they need answered right now.
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- Leadership
- USA
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Content ArticleThe COVID-19 pandemic highlighted systemic weaknesses in the healthcare system. This survey of 3,067 registered nurses working in New Jersey used the Donabedian framework to identify challenges related to providing safe care during the pandemic. Respondents identified several organisational factors, including inadequate resources and staffing, which adversely impacted their ability to adhere to patient safety and infection prevention and control protocols during the pandemic.
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Content ArticleNHS England has outlined plans to develop an improvement approach - NHS IMPACT - to support continuous improvement. There are also ambitions for integrated care systems (ICSs) to become ‘self-improving systems’. This report, written and researched by Sir Chris Ham and jointly commissioned by the NHS Confederation, the Health Foundation and the Q community, reviews the experience of a number of ICSs identified as being at the forefront of this work, focusing on the approaches they have taken and the results achieved.
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- Integrated Care System (ICS)
- Quality improvement
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News Article
Official data masking long waits for the sickest patients
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Several trusts are failing to admit their sickest emergency patients in a timely fashion, despite performing well in official waiting time statistics, HSJ can reveal. The internal NHS England data, obtained via a Freedom of Information request, reveals 12 trusts which have performed above the average against the four-hour accident and emergency target are delivering relatively poor waiting times for patients who require admission, as opposed to those who, for example, can be discharged after being seen. The unpublished provisional data shows an average of just 30% of admitted patients in England spend four hours or less in A&E against the 95% target. But many trusts are falling significantly below this – including those trusts at or around NHSE’s interim target of 76% for four hours performance for all patients by March 2024. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 24 November 2023- Posted
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- Data
- Long waiting list
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News ArticleDoctors have sent a stark warning over the dire state of emergency care for mental health patients after half of A&Es revealed patients were waiting more than five days in hospital before getting the treatment they need. The “truly alarming” figures, shared exclusively with The Independent, show vulnerable patients are being let down by “unacceptable delays” to their treatment, with one campaigner warning the issue has become a national emergency. The data, collated by the Royal College of Emergency Medicine (RCEM), prompted a bleak verdict from top doctor Dr Adrian Boyle who said the system – which sees patients being cared for by A&E staff who are not specifically trained for their needs – was failing the most “fragile” patients. Warning that mental health patients are being hit the hardest by long waits in A&E, Dr Boyle, the RCEM president, added: “These patients need effective and efficient care, they deserve compassionate care – crucially, they deserve better.” Read full story Source: The Independent, 20 November 2023
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- Accident and Emergency
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Content ArticleThe current NHS ‘cost improvement model’ is not sufficient to meet financial constraints, but an allocative efficiency approach being applied at Mersey Care Foundation Trust offers hope, its leaders argue. "34% of expenditure in health and care is attributable to just 8% of complex households, which raises real questions about the efficiency and effectiveness of our combined expenditure, and the waste of resources caused by the multiple contacts we offer to the same people and families without really addressing the root causes of their problems."
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News Article
Hospital launches social care service to reduce ‘astronomical’ delayed discharges
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
An acute trust is launching its own social care service to reduce the ‘astronomical’ costs of delayed discharges. Harrogate and District Foundation Trust is among the first NHS providers to branch out into direct social care provision, in what the trust says is a “lift and shift” from the model adopted by Northumbria Healthcare FT. HDFT is now embarking on a six-month pilot of its new social care service. It comes as around 20 of the trust’s 300 beds are occupied by patients waiting for social care packages on a given day. Chief operating officer Russell Nightingale told HSJ delayed discharges are leading to patients who could have returned home with the right support deteriorating in hospital and ending up in care homes. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 23 November 2023- Posted
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- Social care
- Discharge
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