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Showing results for tags 'Staff support'.
Found 863 results
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Content ArticleA strong focus on systems thinking and an encouragement to apply insights and expertise from human factors and ergonomics is paramount in how we plan, design and deliver healthcare safely. It’s central to the WHO Global Patient Safety Action Plan, the NHS Patient Safety Strategy, new Patient Safety Incident Response Framework (PSIRF) guidance on how to investigate incidents of unsafe care and the National Patient Safety Syllabus.[1-3] It’s something Patient Safety Learning emphasise in our report A Blueprint for Action and is central to the organisational standards for patient safety that we’ve developed.[4] But how should we ‘do’ human factors? How do we apply the concepts, methodologies, tools and techniques in healthcare? What training do we need? How can patient safety managers embed human factors in all of their work, not just a reactive response to incidents of harm? These are some of the questions that patient safety managers have been asking and discussing in the recent Patient Safety Manager Network (PSMN) meetings. The PSMN is an informal voluntary network for patient safety managers in England. Created by and for patient safety managers it provides a weekly drop-in session with guests to talk through issues of importance, providing information, peer support and safe space for discussion. You can find out more about the network here.
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Content ArticleSecond victims are healthcare providers involved in an unexpected adverse event, medical error or injury affecting a patient, who become victims in the sense they are traumatised by it. The purpose of the 'European Researchers' Network Working on Second Victims' is to Introduce an open dialogue among stakeholders about the theoretical conceptualisation and practical consequences of the second victims’ phenomenon based on a cross-national collaboration that integrates different disciplines and approaches. It facilitates discussion and share scientific knowledge, perspectives, and best practices concerning the consequences of adverse events in the healthcare workforce and to implement joint efforts to tackle with the second victims’ phenomenon.
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Content ArticleMeasures of patient safety culture from the perspective of health workers can be used – along with patient-reported experiences of safety, traditional patient safety indicators (see indicator “Safe acute care – surgical complications and obstetric trauma”) and health outcome indicators (see, for example, indicator “Mortality following acute myocardial infarction”) – to give a holistic perspective of the state of safety in health systems.
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Content ArticleThis systematic review in the BJGP aimed to review literature published up to December 2020 on the prevalence of burnout among GPs in general practice, and to determine GP burnout estimates worldwide. The review found: there is moderate to high GP burnout around the world. substantial variations in how burnout is defined, which has resulted in considerable variation in GP burnout prevalence estimates. that this variation presents a challenge in developing a uniform approach that considering GPs' work contexts will allow better understanding and definition of burnout.
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Content Article
TAKE STOCK – Hot debrief tool (29 October 2019)
Patient-Safety-Learning posted an article in Emergency medicine
Debriefing after a patient death or serious incident is important for staff wellbeing, especially in the emergency medicine environment. While on placement in an emergency department, medical student Max Sugarman realised there was no debrief for staff or students involved in critical incidents. This led him to develop the TAKE STOCK hot debrief tool, which is an adaption of the STOP5 model created by Edinburgh EM and the Scottish Centre for Simulation and Clinical Human Factors. In this blog, Max talks about how critical incidents affect staff, how to make time for debriefs and how the TAKE STOCK tool works in practice. -
News Article
Ambulance staff experiencing ‘horrific’ abuse and attacks, NHS warns
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Ambulance staff are experiencing “horrific” abuse from the public as attacks on workers increased by 23% in the wake of the pandemic. Assaults against female ambulance staff have risen by 48% in the last five years, according to a new report from the Association of Ambulance Chief Executives (AACE). In response to rising attacks, the NHS has launched a #workwithoutfear campaign to prevent abuse of ambulance staff. Last year there were 11,749 attacks against ambulance staff, equating to 32 workers being abused or attacked every day. AACE said incidents included kicking, slapping, headbutting and verbal abuse, and ranged from common assault to serious attacks involving knives and weapons. Daren Mochrie, chair of AACE and chief executive of North West Ambulance Service said ambulance staff “face the possibility of violence, assault and aggression” on every shift. “When they occur, these attacks have a significant and lasting impact on the team member, affecting every aspect of their life." Read full story Source: The Independent, 28 February 2022 -
Content ArticleEmployees—physicians and fast-food workers, teachers and hotel staff—are resigning in unprecedented numbers, often in distress. Managers are at a loss for how to respond. Attempts to address employee dissatisfaction and burnout with bonuses, mindfulness, and extra time off do not seem to be working well enough; employees continue to quit, sometimes angrily and dramatically, airing a range of grievances on social media. But what if the problem we typically call “burnout” is not just burnout? What if it is not the other “usual suspects”—depression or anxiety—either? What if it is something that may appear similar, but has a different cause and, if incorrectly addressed, can make individuals feel increasingly worse? Appropriately dealing with the epidemic of employee anguish and quitting requires correctly identifying its causes and using precise terminology to describe it. And while burnout is by far the most popular explanation of employee distress, in many cases, the problem might be a less known, but more insidious: moral injury.
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Content ArticleAs Clare Gerada finished the final house calls of her long career in general practice, it struck her how detached she was from her patients now – and that it was not always like this. Where did we go wrong, and what can we do to fix it? she asks in this article in the Guardian.
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Content Article
Standing tall in the storm, a blog by Sally Howard
Sally Howard posted an article in Leadership for patient safety
We know the link between anxiety, stress, burnout and patient safety. This blog from Sally Howard suggests four things we can do to help us stand tall and continue to grow from strength to strength, both for ourselves and for our teams. -
Content Article
MDU: Cautionary tales - Real member stories
Patient Safety Learning posted an article in Legal matters
These case studies, based on MDU members' real-life experiences, provide a valuable opportunity for shared learning across a wide range of specialties and situations. MDU is a UK medical defence organisation. -
Content ArticleAn introduction to Appreciative Inquiry from NHS England and some team-based exercises for staff.
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Content ArticleCompassion can be defined as ‘a sensitivity to suffering in self and others with a commitment to try to alleviate and prevent it’ (Gilbert 2013). We can experience compassion in different ways: we can feel compassion for other people; we can experience compassion from others; and there is also the compassion we can direct towards ourselves. Compassionate leadership involves a focus on relationships through careful listening to, understanding, empathising with and supporting other people, enabling those we lead to feel valued, respected and cared for, so they can reach their potential and do their best work. There is clear evidence that compassionate leadership results in more engaged and motivated staff with high levels of wellbeing, which in turn results in high-quality care. In this King's Fund explainer, Suzie Bailey and Michael West describe four behaviours of compassionate leadership and why compassionate leadership matters.
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EventuntilThe Royal College of Midwives education and research conference 2022 - Ensuring every voice is heard: promoting inclusivity in education, research and midwifery care This exciting annual conference is aimed at all those involved or interested in midwifery education and research and the overall theme is promoting inclusivity in research and education. The conference is free for RCM members and £75 plus an admin fee for non-RCM members. The objectives of the conference are to: Give a platform to midwifery researchers and educators to highlight their work and spread understanding of their findings and of good practice Provide an opportunity for midwifery researchers and educators, those aspiring to be researchers and educators and others working in the maternity field to build their professional networks Enable those attending to learn about the latest evidence and innovations in midwifery education and research, particularly in relation to promoting inclusivity and reducing inequalities in midwifery education, research and practice. The conference has shared plenary sessions which include both education and research and breakout parallel sessions that focus on either education or research. The conference will have both invited speakers and those who have submitted an abstract that has been accepted for presentation. There will also be panel discussions for audience Q&As and practical workshops on literature searching and writing for publication. Overall conference themes The contribution of midwifery education and research to reducing inequalities and improving inclusion in maternity care, Hearing lesser heard voices to improve education, research and practice, Embedding the future midwife standards in education, research and practice Supporting the mental health of midwives, maternity staff, educators, student midwives and the women and families we serve. Book a place
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Content Article
Queensland Health: Fatigue risk management systems
Patient Safety Learning posted an article in Good practice
This guideline has been developed to support all Australia's Queensland Health workplaces to identify and manage fatigue risks. It draws on lessons learnt from over a decade of implementing fatigue risk management systems (FRMSs) in Queensland Hospital and Health Services (HHSs) and from proven approaches to safety risk management. -
Content ArticleA doctor describes why they left clinical practice for the sake of their mental health and how healthcare organisations can create more supportive environments.
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Content ArticleAn author turned junior doctor’s account of the chaos at work and anguish at home as Covid-19 arrived in the UK.
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Content ArticleThis episode of the Hope4Med podcast features pharmacist Soojin Jun, co-founder of Patients for Patient Safety US and patient advocate with a passion for patient safety, quality improvement, and health equity. Dr. Jun shares the life-changing experience that affected her family and led to her career in healthcare. She discusses the importance of effective communication in healthcare, not only between patients and providers but also between providers. Miscommunications can cost a life. We also explore how burnout and moral injury can further harm when healthcare professionals are not functioning at their optimal level.
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Content Article
In this blog, Patient Safety Learning’s Chief Executive, Helen Hughes, reflects on participating in a recent Health Service Journal (HSJ) Patient Safety Congress webinar, held in association with BD, which considered some of the key emerging patient safety issues for 2022.- Posted
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News Article
‘Don’t overwork staff’, says trust with just one 52-week waiter
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Allowing staff enough rest has been ‘the key’ to elective recovery for an acute trust which has the lowest number of 52-week waiters in England, it has said. Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells (MTW) Trust currently has just one patient who has waited 52 weeks or more on its lists, compared with a high of 976 at one point in April 2021. MTW is one of a handful of trusts with very few long waiters. All are relatively small trusts – and are not regional centres for specialist/tertiary patients – but their 52-week-waiters also represent less than 1% of their total list. MTW chief of service for the surgery division Greg Lawton told HSJ its success in tackling long waiters was down to “attention to detail” in tracking each patient, and not expecting staff to run too many extra sessions. “Any problems patients are having getting through their pathways are identified early and addressed,” he said. "Treatment had been prioritised on the grounds of clinical need, he added, with cancer treatments still going ahead and cancer targets being met." The trust, in the South East, has put on extra operating sessions to clear some of its backlog of patients but these had been limited in number, Dr Lawton said. “What we have never done is try to run too many and I think that may be the key. If you try to do too much you will burn staff out,” he said. The trust had “been mindful that staff need a break,” he added. “Morale is very important.” Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 16 February 2022 -
News ArticleRegistered nurses at Alhambra Hospital Medical Center in Los Angeles, California, voted overwhelmingly in favor of ratifying a new three-year contract yesterday, winning protections to improve patient safety and nurse retention.. The collective bargaining agreement was the result of an almost six-month fight, which included an informational picket for patient safety and multiple other actions. So Hee Park, an ICU nurse at Alhambra, said, “We are so thrilled that after months of negotiations, we have ratified an agreement that provides substantial measures to ensure nurses feel supported and can continue to provide optimal patient care, as well as numerous provisions that will improve recruitment and retention of experienced nurses.” The contract includes several highlights that will help nurses create better outcomes for their patients, such as provisions for ensuring hospital compliance with existing registered nurse-to-patient safe staffing laws. The agreement also establishes a new Infectious Disease Task Force that will offer new protections against communicable diseases and guarantee levels of PPE supplies. The contract also expands workplace violence prevention plans for all hospital units, as well as stating that quality care be provided to all patients regardless of their immigration status. Under the contract, nurses will also receive proper orientation when they’re floated to new hospital units, improving care for patients. And, rather than being sent home at management's whims, RNs will be able to remain at work to provide meal and break relief to other nurses, bolstering safe staffing. These measures will ensure nurses are prepared to provide patients with the highest and safest levels of care possible, resulting in improved nurse retention at Alhambra, which will benefit the entire community long term. Read full story Source: National Nurses United, 10 November 2022
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News ArticleRegistered nurses (RNs) at US Prime Healthcare’s West Anaheim Medical Center (WAMC) will hold an informational picket today to protest chronic short staffing and its impact on safe patient care. Nurses say that the hospital should cancel elective surgeries because those beds and nurses are needed for other emergent patients. RNs in all medical departments are short-staffed, putting patient safety in jeopardy. “Nurses are under incredible pressure to care for patients beyond the state’s mandated safe staffing ratios due to the staffing crisis in our hospital,” said John Olarte, RN at WAMC. “The employer should be making beds available by canceling elective surgeries for the foreseeable future. Save those beds for the patients who most need them and at the same time give the RNs a chance to truly care for these patients by not forcing nurses to take patients that don’t need to be in the hospital right now. The public needs to know that the hospital is not doing everything they can to help the nurses care for patients.” “There is a staffing crisis because RNs are leaving,” said Sofia Rivera, RN in the emergency department at WAMC, “To attract and retain quality nurses — just staff the floors so the RNs do not have to pick up multiple extra shifts due to the revolving door of RNs in this hospital.” Nurses say they want a strong contract so they can recruit and retain RNs and they want to establish a health and safety committee to ensure they have a voice on issues of nurse safety and patient care. They have been in contract negotiations since May 2021. Their contract expired in June 2021. “We are getting slaughtered in the ER,” said Rasha Tran, RN. “Ambulances are just leaving their patients in the ER instead of waiting for an available bed because they are waiting too long. I don’t even know how we can sustain this demand to care for so many patients. It means less care for each patient. Continuing elective surgeries means that a regular bed is not available for a patient in the ER who is now is being held for hours or days before they are admitted. Even before this most recent Covid surge, nurses have been picking up extra 12-hour shifts to help our coworkers, often without a break for meals or rest periods.” Read full story Source: National Nurses United, 11 February 2022
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Content ArticleThis report from CIPD examines the latest evidence and the experiences of employees experiencing long COVID, and offers recommendations for organisations on how to effectively support those with long COVID to return to, and stay in, work.
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Content ArticleThis blog for The Kings Fund looks at how chronic excessive workload is damaging staff health, patient care and healthcare workers' long-term ability to provide high-quality and compassionate care for people in their communities. The authors argue that the issue of excessive workload is the major barrier preventing improvements in patient satisfaction, staff retention, financial performance and care outcomes.
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Content Article
BBC Sounds podcast - The Backlog (9 February 2022)
Patient-Safety-Learning posted an article in Exit strategies
This is the first episode in a series of podcasts by Natasha Loder, Health Policy Editor at The Economist, about the care backlog currently facing the health service. After more than two years battling Covid-19, the NHS is struggling through its worst winter crisis in living memory and is facing a daunting task to clear the huge backlog exacerbated by the pandemic. Nearly six million people are on the NHS waiting list for routine treatment in England alone. As patients, often with worsening conditions, pour back into the NHS after putting off treatment, health secretary Sajid Javid warns waiting lists could top thirteen million. In this first episode, Natasha speaks to frontline workers, managers, policy experts, and patients to assess the pressure created by the unprecedented demand on the different areas of the NHS from emergency services to GP surgeries. -
Content ArticleThis qualitative study in Antimicrobial Resistance & Infection Control aimed to identify institutional actions, strategies and policies related to healthcare workers’ safety perception during the early phase of the Covid-19 pandemic at a tertiary care centre in Switzerland. The authors interviewed healthcare workers from different clinics, professions, and positions. The study identified transparent communication as the most important factor affecting healthcare worker's safety perceptions during the first wave. This knowledge can be used to help hospitals better prepare for future infectious disease threats and outbreaks.
