Improving Patients' Safety
The cost of clinical negligence claims has recently given rise to much negative press. We would like to shift the focus away from legal costs onto the more important issue of patients’ safety.
We have considered various papers produced by the Health Service over the years. We have attempted to analyse the rhetoric, assess any developments (or lack thereof) and consider what IM can contribute to campaigning for patients’ safety. We have attempted to pull these issues together to reposition the debate – instead of looking at the end result and the legal costs when things going wrong, the emphasis should be on reducing adverse events at source. If this were achieved, the human cost, let alone the financial costs, would be reduced significantly.
Click the links below to read the patient safety paper, written by Ian Christian, Lindsay Gibb and Sarah Rowland:
A reminder of the starting point
Why are mistakes made?
Why are mistakes repeated?
Comparisons with safety in the aviation industry
Progressing from rhetoric to results
Conclusion