Thread by @danielgoyal

Raising concerns about patient safety

Where problems with care seem national, those of us actually delivering care can feel quite helpless to change it. Take the government’s pandemic policy...

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gmc-uk.org/ethical-guidan…

We on the frontline are also victims, collateral damage, of ill-conceived healthcare policies.
But the GMC guidelines, while adding yet another responsibility on our shoulders, also provides the encouragement and compulsion to speak out.

“If you have reason to believe that patients are, or may be, at risk of death or serious harm for any reason, you should report your concern.. Do not delay doing so because you yourself are not in a position to put the matter right”

These days, most shifts may feel like patients are being put at risk of serious harm. To follow these guidelines then, would require some form of action after every shift. There is likely, with the current staffing and bed crisis, a common theme for the concerns raised.

Even a brief email, “another shift with not enough staff or beds to safely manage the number of patients..”. It may get tedious and feel like whining. But if your line manager ‘gets it’, they will be grateful. For they will forward it to their line manager, and so on…

This achieves two things. Firstly, it apportions the responsibility to those with the power to affect change. Secondly, when the errors or risks start to materialise, the lack of resources is not an excuse, it is a discoverable fact.

Our duty is neither to state nor to organisation:
“You have a duty to put patients’ interests first and act to protect them, which overrides personal and professional loyalties."

Our duty is to deliver care based on the ‘best available evidence’, not on local or national policies. This of course means challenging policies not in our patients best interests.

#TeamNHS
#TeamGP
@HZiauddeen @trishgreenhalgh @CNagpaul @DrSimonHodes @doctor_oxford