Three quarters of NHS trusts are endangering patients by not complying with safety alerts meant to stop fatal errors recurring.
According to the BBC, the Actions Against Medical Accidents charity (or AvMA) found that 80 trusts in England had not complied with 10 or more patient safety alerts.
The charity’s Chief Executive Peter Walsh said, “Lives are being put at risk.”
The Department of Health have reacted swiftly to comment on the findings stating that, not only did it expect all trusts to comply with the alerts and to “record and action them” but that they would be “…issuing all NHS organisations a formal reminder to do this.”
The patient safety alert system provides that the National Patient Safety Agency can issue guidance to NHS organisations to tighten procedures. However, it appears that compliance with these recommendations has been lacking and the AvMA want to see more done to ensure that the recommendations are implemented.
The figures do not make for pleasant reading. Not only have 80 trusts not complied with 10 or more alerts but on a wider scale 300 trusts have yet to comply with at least one alert and 200 have not complied with alerts dating back for a period of five years.
An example would be that, following advice from the National Patient Safety Agency, Hinchingbrooke Healthcare NHS trust failed to update its staff on the correct way to test the position of feeding tubes and a year later a patient died after a feeding tube was placed in to their lung instead of their stomach.
What is the point of having these groups and charities in place if you are only going to ignore any recommendations that they make? All you will do is put patients at further risk of injury and the money that would need to be found to fund these changes to the system would no doubt be saved in the long run through a reduction in claims for medical negligence.
At least the Department of Health appear to be taking the matter seriously. They have announced that, come April 2010, the Care Quality Commission will have improved powers to monitor incidents and ensure compliance with alerts.
