The Irish Times writes a proposal that clinicians and hospitals in Ireland be required to inform safety and oversight agencies of serious patient safety incidents has been welcomed by the Ombudsman. Publishing a progress report on the complaints system in the State’s hospitals, the Ombudsman Peter Tyndall expressed concern that there had been no specific evaluation of the open disclosure programme in acute hospitals, despite a statutory framework put in place last year and the system has remained entirely voluntary. There are, however, proposals in the Patient Safety Bill to make open disclosure of serious reportable patient safety incidents mandatory. It was also proposed that clinicians and hospitals will be required to inform the relevant safety and oversight agencies, such as the Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA), of incidents, and extending the remit of the HIQA to private health services.
Read more:
- General Scheme Patient Safety Bill 5 July 2018 (PDF)
- Irish Times: https://www.irishtimes.com/news/health/plan-for-reporting-hospital-incidents-welcomed-1.3696642
- Learning to Get Better: Progress Report – A report on the progress made following the Ombudsman’s investigation into how public hospitals handle complaints. Ombudsman. November 2018 (PDF)