Latest news with #patientharm
The Independent
16 hours ago
- Health
- The Independent
NHS England approach to doctors' strike ‘seriously risky', BMA warns
A senior doctors' union leader has warned NHS England's approach to the upcoming five-day strike by resident doctors is 'seriously risky' and could lead to patient harm in emergency departments. British Medical Association (BMA) deputy chairwoman Dr Emma Runswick told BBC Radio 4's Today programme on Tuesday that guidance issued by the health service to keep most planned care running during the walkout could cause dangerous confusion and overstretch staff. 'We've had proven systems over the last decade that have made sure that where we have to take strike action, senior doctors cover urgency and critical care,' she said. 'This time round, NHS England are pushing for the continuation of non-urgent and scheduled care in a way that we think at best is confusing and will create on-the-day cancellations – and at worst could be risky and lead to harm in emergency departments and on wards, because senior doctors cannot physically be in two places at once. 'We think that a notional guidance from NHS England which is saying that basically all scheduled work should continue to go ahead has potential to be seriously risky for patients.' Her comments come amid an escalating row between NHS bosses and the BMA over how hospitals should respond to the strike, which is due to begin at 7am on Friday. During previous rounds of industrial action in 2023 and 2024, NHS England told trusts to cancel large volumes of non-urgent care so that consultants could step in to cover emergency services. But under the leadership of new NHS England chief executive Sir Jim Mackey, hospitals have now been instructed to cancel non-urgent work only in 'exceptional circumstances' – and only with prior approval. The BMA argues this new approach risks spreading non-striking doctors too thinly, with Dr Runswick warning: 'Senior doctors are needed to be freed up in order to provide urgency and critical care. 'We think the vast majority of planned and unscheduled care should be shifted. 'There are always, in every hospital, local medical managers, local clinical leaders, who will make decisions about what is safe to go ahead – but trying to maintain scheduled care during this strike is not safe in many cases.' When asked why the union could not avoid strikes altogether, she said walkouts can be delivered safely if planned properly. 'Strikes by doctors do not have to be risky,' she said. 'Strikes by doctors have been run safely in 2016 and 2022, 2023, 2024. 'We are entirely capable of running strikes safely – they just have to be planned for with local medical leadership, and we've done that before. We can do it again.' She said the BMA was still hopeful a resolution could be reached before the walkout begins and was 'keen to work with NHS England to ensure they are best planned for the safest care'. Talks between the Government and the BMA have continued in recent days, with Health Secretary Wes Streeting ruling out any additional pay rise this year but indicating other aspects of the contract – such as student debt, exam fees and working conditions – may be up for negotiation. Resident doctors, formerly known as junior doctors, were awarded an average 5.4% pay increase this financial year, following a 22% rise over the previous two years. However, the BMA says real-terms pay has still fallen by around 20% since 2008, and is pushing for full 'pay restoration'.
Yahoo
17 hours ago
- Health
- Yahoo
NHS England approach to doctors' strike ‘seriously risky', BMA warns
A senior doctors' union leader has warned NHS England's approach to the upcoming five-day strike by resident doctors is 'seriously risky' and could lead to patient harm in emergency departments. British Medical Association (BMA) deputy chairwoman Dr Emma Runswick told BBC Radio 4's Today programme on Tuesday that guidance issued by the health service to keep most planned care running during the walkout could cause dangerous confusion and overstretch staff. 'We've had proven systems over the last decade that have made sure that where we have to take strike action, senior doctors cover urgency and critical care,' she said. 'This time round, NHS England are pushing for the continuation of non-urgent and scheduled care in a way that we think at best is confusing and will create on-the-day cancellations – and at worst could be risky and lead to harm in emergency departments and on wards, because senior doctors cannot physically be in two places at once. 'We think that a notional guidance from NHS England which is saying that basically all scheduled work should continue to go ahead has potential to be seriously risky for patients.' Her comments come amid an escalating row between NHS bosses and the BMA over how hospitals should respond to the strike, which is due to begin at 7am on Friday. During previous rounds of industrial action in 2023 and 2024, NHS England told trusts to cancel large volumes of non-urgent care so that consultants could step in to cover emergency services. But under the leadership of new NHS England chief executive Sir Jim Mackey, hospitals have now been instructed to cancel non-urgent work only in 'exceptional circumstances' – and only with prior approval. The BMA argues this new approach risks spreading non-striking doctors too thinly, with Dr Runswick warning: 'Senior doctors are needed to be freed up in order to provide urgency and critical care. 'We think the vast majority of planned and unscheduled care should be shifted. 'There are always, in every hospital, local medical managers, local clinical leaders, who will make decisions about what is safe to go ahead – but trying to maintain scheduled care during this strike is not safe in many cases.' When asked why the union could not avoid strikes altogether, she said walkouts can be delivered safely if planned properly. 'Strikes by doctors do not have to be risky,' she said. 'Strikes by doctors have been run safely in 2016 and 2022, 2023, 2024. 'We are entirely capable of running strikes safely – they just have to be planned for with local medical leadership, and we've done that before. We can do it again.' She said the BMA was still hopeful a resolution could be reached before the walkout begins and was 'keen to work with NHS England to ensure they are best planned for the safest care'. Talks between the Government and the BMA have continued in recent days, with Health Secretary Wes Streeting ruling out any additional pay rise this year but indicating other aspects of the contract – such as student debt, exam fees and working conditions – may be up for negotiation. Resident doctors, formerly known as junior doctors, were awarded an average 5.4% pay increase this financial year, following a 22% rise over the previous two years. However, the BMA says real-terms pay has still fallen by around 20% since 2008, and is pushing for full 'pay restoration'.
Daily Mail
3 days ago
- Health
- Daily Mail
NHS CEO orders hospitals to be tough with striking doctors and not 'tolerate harm and risk' to patients caused by major walkout starting this week
The head of NHS England has demanded hospital bosses get tough on resident doctors to prevent major harm to patients being caused by a strike due to start this week. The British Medical Association has vowed emergency and maternity services will remain covered when medics walk out for five days from Friday. But Sir Jim Mackey, the chief executive of NHS England, said that previous industrial action from residents - formerly junior doctors - had cause more harm to patients than previously thought. Speaking ahead of the walkout he said the cancellation and postponement of elective surgery had had a major knock-on effect, telling the Sunday Times: 'We all tolerated levels of harm and risk last time that I really just don't think we should anymore. 'We'll be taking a different approach... 'I personally met patients and families in my trust (Newcastle), who'd had a late cancer diagnosis, a late Parkinson's diagnosis, who came to harm later on that were not caught in that initial assessment and reporting.' The last round of strikes, which also included walkouts by other health workers, came at an estimated cost of £1.5 billion to the NHS in England. Some 1.5 million appointments, procedures and operations were postponed as a result of the stoppages. On Thursday, The Times reported that it had seen an audit which found that five patients died as a result of disruption linked to strikes by junior doctors in 2023 and 2024. One prevention of future death report detailed how 71-year-old Daphne Austin, who had a kidney injury, died after getting 'no medical input' on one of the strike days because the consultant who was covering was in charge of 25 patients. Another states that 60-year-old John Doyle died of 'natural causes against a background of missed opportunities to diagnose and treat cytomegalovirus infection, together with the impact of the resident (formerly junior) doctors' strike on the provision of consistent patient care'. Last September resident doctors voted to accept a Government pay deal worth 22.3 per cent on average over two years. The 2025/26 pay deal saw resident doctors given a 4 per cent increase plus £750 'on a consolidated basis', working out as an average rise of 5.4 per cent. Government officials said these two increases equate to a 28.9 per cent pay rise. But the BMA now says they need 29.2 per cent to reverse 'pay erosion' since 2008/09. After meeting union leaders on Thursday, Health Secretary Wes Streeting reiterated that 'we cannot move on pay after a 28.9 per cent pay rise' but the Government is looking at ways to improve resident doctors' working lives.
New York Times
15-07-2025
- Health
- New York Times
Even Grave Errors at Rehab Hospitals Go Unpenalized and Undisclosed
Rehab hospitals that help people recover from major surgeries and injuries have become a highly lucrative slice of the health care business. But federal data and inspection reports show that some run by the dominant company, Encompass Health Corporation, and other for-profit corporations have had rare but serious incidents of patient harm and perform below average on two key safety measures tracked by Medicare. Yet even when inspections reveal grave cases of injury, federal health officials do not inform consumers or impose fines the way they do for nursing homes. And Medicare doesn't provide easy to understand five-star ratings as it does for general hospitals. In the most serious problems documented by regulators, rehab hospital errors involved patient deaths. In Encompass Health's hospital in Huntington, Elizabeth VanBibber, 73, was fatally poisoned by a carbon monoxide leak during construction at the facility. At its hospital in Jackson, Tenn., a patient, 68, was found dead overnight, lying on the floor in a 'pool of blood' after an alarm that was supposed to alert nurses that he had gotten out of bed had been turned off. In its hospital in Sioux Falls, S.D., a nurse gave Frederick Roufs, 73, the wrong drug, one of 26 medication errors the hospital made over six months. He died two days later at another hospital. For-profit rehab facilities now treat most patients. Encompass Health is the largest chain. Source: KFF Health News and The New York Times By The New York Times Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
The Guardian
13-05-2025
- Health
- The Guardian
NHS medical negligence liabilities hit £58.2bn amid calls to improve patient safety
The NHS's total liabilities for medical negligence have hit an 'astounding' £58.2bn amid ministers' failure to improve patient safety, an influential group of MPs have warned. The Commons public accounts committee (PAC) said the 'jaw-dropping' sums being paid to victims of botched treatment and government inaction to reduce errors were 'unacceptable'. The Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) has set aside £58.2bn to settle lawsuits arising from clinical negligence that occurred in England before 1 April 2024, the PAC disclosed. The sum is so huge that it is the second-largest liability across the whole of government, with only nuclear decommissioning costlier, the committee said in a damning report. 'The fact that government has set aside tens of billions of pounds for clinical negligence payments, its second most costly liability after some of the world's most complex nuclear decommissioning projects, should give our entire society pause,' said Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, the PAC chair. 'This is a sign of a system struggling to do right by the people it is designed to help,' he added. The PAC urged ministers to take urgent steps to reduce 'tragic incidences of patient harm' and to also end a situation where lawyers take an 'astronomical' 19% of the compensation awarded to those who are successful in suing the NHS. That amounted to £536m of the £2.8bn that the health service in England paid out in damages in 2023-24 – its record bill for mistakes. 'Far too many patients still suffer clinical negligence which can cause devastating harm to those affected,' and the ensuing damages drain vital funds from the NHS, the report said. A DHSC source accepted the PAC's findings, saying: 'The cost of clinical negligence claims is rising at an unsustainable rate, eating into resources available for frontline care. Annual cash payments have more than doubled in the last 10 years and quadrupled in the past 17 years to £2.8bn.' The PAC criticised the department for not yet having explained why patient harm occurs and devised a strategy to overhaul patient safety, despite the committee in the last parliament asking the DHSC do so by last summer. The DHSC 'has only recently written to us in response' to that recommendation, the PAC said. 'It is unacceptable that the department is yet to develop a plan to deal with the cost of clinical negligence claims and so much taxpayers' money is being spent on legal fees,' the report says. Paul Whiteing, the chief executive of patient safety charity Action Against Medical Accidents, said that lawsuits arose over errors by NHS staff in every area of care. 'But the largest sums are awarded to families of babies that are left with lifelong disabilities, such as brain damage, through negligence at birth.' The NHS has faced a series of maternity care scandals in recent years that have left mothers and babies dead or badly injured. In 2023 the Care Quality Commission, the health service care regulator, said that two-thirds of maternity units provided substandard care. The NHS would face fewer lawsuits if it was more open when mistakes happen, Whiteing added. 'We see many people who only litigate because the NHS 'pulled down the shutters', by which I mean failed to properly look into what went wrong, offer a meaningful apology for their mistake and involve the family in the investigation. If steps such as these were followed, many fewer people would resort to litigation,' he said. Jess Brown-Fuller, a Liberal Democrat health spokesperson, said the huge cost of NHS medical negligence payouts are 'symptomatic of a health service that simply is not functioning. The Labour government's embrace of dither and delay on social care, maternity reforms and rebuilding our hospitals is prolonging the misery.' In its analysis of the DHSC's annual report and accounts for 2023-24, the PAC also revealed the cost of building long-planned new high containment labs in Harlow, Essex, to help protect the UK against infectious diseases, had spiralled from £530m to 'an eye-watering projected £3.2bn'. And it criticised the government for not spelling out what impact its decision to abolish NHS England and axe tens of thousands of health service managers would have on patients and staff. It voiced concern about cuts to dentistry, GP services and health prevention. Matthew Taylor, the chief executive of the NHS Confederation, echoed the PAC's unease. 'While many leaders understand the need for change, the lack of detail on how the national shake-up will be taken forward, the pace of this restructure, and how it connects to the ambitions of the 10-year plan are a cause for concern among staff,' he said. A DHSC spokesperson said: 'Patient safety is the bedrock of a healthy NHS and social care system. This government will ensure the country has the best system in place to keep patients safe by overhauling the overly complex bureaucracy of healthcare regulation and oversight and we will examine the drivers of costs, how to manage spending on clinical negligence and the potential merits of reform options.'
