This story was first published in digitalhealth.net
Hunt announces plans to end NHS ‘cover-up culture’
Hunt announced his plans at the first ministerial-level Global Patient Safety Summit, taking place 9-10 March to a selection of health ministers, senior delegates and expert clinicians from across the world.
During the summit, the Health Secretary detailed a range of new proposals, including an independent Healthcare Safety Investigation Branch and legal protection for anyone giving information following a hospital mistake. Such legal ‘safe spaces’ mean those co-operating with investigations will be supported and protected when speaking up about mistakes within the NHS.
The plans mean from April 2018, expert medical examiners will independently review and confirm the cause of all deaths, as recommended by the Shipman Inquiry and Robert Francis following the events of the Mid Staffs scandal.
The system which is currently in use has remained largely unchanged for over 50 years, but has lead to significant variations in the number of deaths that are investigated.
Hunt said: “A huge amount of progress has been made in improving our safety culture following the tragic events at Mid Staffs but to deliver a safer NHS for patients, seven days a week, we need to unshackle ourselves from a quick-fix blame culture and acknowledge that sometimes bad mistakes can be made by good people.
“It is a scandal that every week there are potentially 150 avoidable deaths in our hospitals and it is up to us all to make the need for whistleblowing and secrecy a thing of the past as we reform the NHS and its values and move from blaming to learning.
“Today we take a step forward to building a new era of openness and the safest healthcare system in the world.”
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