'Little progress' for NHS patient safety over past 20 years, says chief inspector of hospitals

“Little progress” has been made improving patient safety in the NHS over the past 20 years, said the Chief Inspector of Hospitals at the Care Quality Commission (CQC). 

Professor Ted Baker yesterday revealed he receives between 500 and 600 reports of “never events” a year, incidents that are wholly preventable whatever the circumstances.

This includes an occasion where surgeons operated on the wrong eye of a patient.

Speaking at Patient Safety Learning's annual conference, he said that hospital managers routinely hide evidence from the CQC, because they regard the organisation as out to blame them.

The chief inspector called for a fundamental change in culture whereby NHS bosses drove safety improvements for their own sake, rather than in order to pass an inspection.

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Source: The Telegraph, 2 October 2019