The patient safety campaign, Sign up to Safety is one of a set of national initiatives in England to help the NHS improve the safety of patient care. Collectively and cumulatively these initiatives aim to reduce avoidable harm by 50% and support the ambition to save 6,000 lives.
So far over 300 NHS organisations have pledged support to this growing movement and are committed to improve the safety of healthcare through locally-owned and self-directed Safety Improvement Plans. These outline the actions that will be taken in response to five Sign up to Safety pledges.
Natasha Swinscoe, Director of Development for the West of England AHSN, said: “By joining Sign up to Safety, we are demonstrating that we are placing the safety of patient care above all else. We are encouraging our member organisations across the region to also sign up and we will actively support them in delivering their pledges.
“In particular, we will work on a range of patient safety projects, which have been developed through consultation and engagement with our members, ensuring local priorities are addressed.
“We are committed to developing capacity and capability in safety and promote a continuous learning environment which will help make our member organisations more aware of patient safety issues and develop a culture which supports learning.”
Suzette Woodward, Sign up to Safety Campaign Director, said: “Our ambition is for the whole NHS in England to become the safest healthcare system in the world and the West of England AHSN is playing a critical part in helping to achieve this.
“We all recognise that healthcare carries some risk and while everyone working in the NHS works hard every day to reduce this risk, harm still happens. Whenever possible, we must do all we can to deliver harm-free care for each and every patient. We are helping each NHS organisation involved in Sign up to Safety to work on the things that matter to them and keep local solutions localised, but help to share learning nationally for others to adapt.
“The five Sign up to Safety pledges represent the shared values and beliefs of those committed to creating a movement for patient safety that spans the whole system. We are united by our common goal; to continually strive to make the care we give our patients as safe as possible. Together we are helping the NHS to make improvements and creating a supportive, open and transparent environment for all patients and staff.”
The five Sign up to Safety pledges are:
- Put safety first. Commit to reducing avoidable harm in the NHS by half and make public the goals and plans developed locally.
- Continually learn. Be more resilient to risks as an organisation, by acting on the feedback from patients and by constantly measuring and monitoring how safe services are.
- Be Honest. Be transparent with people about progress to tackle patient safety issues and support staff to be candid with patients and their families if something goes wrong.
- Collaborate. Take a leading role in supporting local collaborative learning, so that improvements are made across all of the local services that patients use.
- Be Supportive. Help people understand why things go wrong and how to put them right. Give staff the time and support to improve and celebrate progress.
Sign up
Find out more about Sign up to Safety and sign up here.
