Trusts and CCGs given new deadline to appoint patient safety specialists

Every trust, foundation trust and CCG has been told to identify one or more people as their full-time patient safety specialist and tell NHS England’s national patient safety team who these individuals are by the end of November.

The specialists would lead patient safety improvement at their organisations, and would have direct access to their executive teams, including “access at no notice to escalate immediate risks or issues”.

Other NHS organisations are also encouraged to appoint patient safety specialists “if they are able to,” but NHSE said “we recognise that some organisations, particularly smaller providers outside the secondary care sector, may not yet be in a position to do so”.

The patient safety specialists role was proposed in NHSE’s patient safety strategy in July 2019. NHSE originally asked organisations to appoint patient safety specialists by April 2020, but this was delayed as the health service focused on the covid-19 pandemic.

In a briefing published on 25 August, NHSE said it will “agree specific responsibilities” for the patient safety specialists once they are identified by local organisations.

NHSE has told trusts and CCGs they should not have to recruit new people to be patient safety specialists, unless they wish to. But it expects the new roles to be filled by people in existing patient safety-related roles, and for the specialists to be focusing solely on patient safety from April 2021.