World Patient Safety Day

Today is the first ever World Patient Safety Day recognised by the World Health Organisation. This is an important move for patient safety in England and across the world.

World Patient Safety Day provides a focal point for healthcare and patient safety bodies, all over the world, to recognise the work they are doing and to share intelligence and resources with other organisations to improve patient safety system-wide.

Patient safety is being discussed at HEE Board today reflecting on some of the excellent patient safety initiatives HEE has been championing including:

• The HEE strategic response to Improving safety through education and training link to website
• HEE Wessex celebrating its 11th year of a Patient Safety First Programme for junior doctors, neonatal preceptees and pharmacy staff. Over 2500 front line staff, 1300 projects so far.
• Over 180 front line staff trained on HEE Wessex 2-day Human Factors programme since 2017 – working to support safer care.
• The new Patient Safety Repository

HEE has an important part to play in ensuring staff are well trained and that the quality of their learning environments are good. However, the importance of patient safety, and the complex nature of the NHS, means that safety cannot be the responsibility of any one organisation, many other bodies also have a part to play in ensuring safety in the NHS.

Professor Wendy Reid, Executive Director of Education and Quality and Medical Director, Health Education England said:

“The introduction of the World Patient Safety Day is significant, giving patient safety an international profile. It allows organisations to reflect and recognise the work they are doing to improve patient safety and provides a platform to share that work and create momentum. HEE has been working with the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges to ensure there is a national patient safety syllabus for all NHS staff. This is will be an important step in advancing the importance in Patient Safety across all areas of healthcare” 

HEE will continue to work collaboratively across the system to promote patient safety we have a crucial role in supporting quality improvement and patient safety by supporting workforce transformation and by providing education, training and development to our staff and learners.

The recently published NHS Improvement Strategy for Patient Safety in the NHS sets out the next stage of patient safety improvement with an ambitious plan for change that is aligned to the People Plan. HEE will support this approach and is committed to working in partnership with NHS Improvement and other system partners to continue to develop patient safety capacity and capability throughout the NHS.

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(19)32134-8/fulltext