World Health Organisation – World Patient Safety Day 17th September

The World Health Organisation (‘WHO’) are launching their first-ever World Patient Safety Day[1].

It will be held world-wide on 17 September 2019. Their aim is a global campaign to create awareness of patient safety and urge people to show their commitment to making healthcare safer.

There is a good reason for this. Globally WHO say that;

1)      134 million adverse events occur each year due to unsafe care in hospitals in low- and middle-income countries, contributing to 2.6 million deaths annually, and

2)      15% of hospital expenses can be attributed to treating patient safety failures in OECD countries, and

3)      4 out of 10 patients are harmed in the primary and ambulatory settings; up to 80% of harm in these settings can be avoided.

In the UK the NHS are required to record the number of patient safety incidents. The most recent report available from the NHS[2] shows a year on year increase in the number of reported patient safety incidents. They have grown from 1,895,835 to 1,991,797 in the year to September 2018. An increase of about 5%.

The top 4 incident categories were;

• Patient accident – where an implement was left inside  a person after surgery
• Implementation of care and ongoing monitoring/review – causing an infection to spread
• Access, admission, transfer and discharge – leading to a delay in treatment
• Medication – where the wrong drug or incorrect dose was prescribed

Most recorded patient safety events occurred in acute/general hospital, mental health service community nursing, medical service and ambulance service.

The degree of harm caused to patients ranged from no harm at all, through to severe harm including the death of a patient.

Not all patient safety incidence are the result of clinical negligence. However, some are and so if you feel that you or a loved one suffered an injury as a result of medical negligence then please contact us if you wish to discuss your potential claim for compensation.

Our expert Medical Negligence team consist of dedicated specialists with many years of experience in pursuing successful claims for medical negligence. We provide a free, defined, no obligation, review of your circumstances to see whether there may be grounds for a claim.

Our main aim is that you, or your loved ones, should receive the support they need following proved negligence. We also know that working on your case can highlight errors so that lessons can be learned and similar situations can be avoided in the future.

If you want to know more about the World Health Organisation, please click here.

Dr Darren Conway PhD is a solicitor in the Medical Negligence Department here at Sternberg Reed, specialising in all aspects of Medical Negligence and Clinical Negligence Claims. If you want to find out more and see how Darren and Sternberg Reed could help you, click HERE

Or call us on 0844 800 9860 or 0208 591 3366

This article does not constitute legal advice and you should contact us directly if you are facing a similar situation.

[1] https://www.who.int/campaigns/world-patient-safety-day/2019

[2] https://improvement.nhs.uk/documents/5065/NAPSIR_commentary_March_2019_Final.pdf