Public can make submissions on patient safety review in healthcare sector

The public has six weeks in which to make submissions on new national standards on how patient safety incidents are reviewed in the healthcare sector.

The public consultation on the new draft national standards for conduct of reviews of patient safety incidents has been prompted by findings from the chief medical officer’s 2014 Report on Perinatal Deaths in HSE Midland Regional Hospital Portlaoise.

It recommended the development of national standards on the conduct of reviews of patient safety incidents, claiming there were shortfalls with the current system, including confusion regarding incident classification, inconsistency in the time taken to conduct and complete reviews, variable quality of reviews, and insufficient procedures for anonymising incidents.