4,600 NHS patient deaths linked to safety incidents

New hospital data has revealed that more than 4,600 patient deaths have been linked to safety incidents at hospital, mental health and ambulance trusts.

Recorded by the National Reporting & Learning System (NRLS), the types of patient safety issues include problems with medication, the type of care given, staffing and infection control. In total 4,668 deaths were linked to patient safety incidents, of which 530 deaths specifically linked to mental health trusts and 73 to ambulance trusts.

The NRLS says that deaths are not always ‘clear-cut’ and cannot always be attributed to patient safety incidents. However, under the ‘degree of harm’ section recorded on the system, there were 4,688 cases listed as death.

In total, 4,356,277 reports of patient safety incidents were reported between November 2018 and October 2019. These are described as issues where unintended or unexpected incidents which could have – or did – lead to harm of a patient under the care of the NHS.