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Blog

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Blog

Quality improvement for patient safety: a chance to steady the ship?

Does the recommissioning of the Academic Health Science Networks’ patient safety collaboratives mark a renewed commitment to quality improvement for the NHS? In this blog, Ben Collins considers the NHS’s relationship with quality improvement and the challenges it faces in bringing about real improvements in quality.
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By Ben Collins - 6 March 2019
Blog

Hidden from the targets: how long are patients waiting for NHS care?

Deteriorating performance against national waiting time targets is one of the most visible signs of the increasing pressures facing the NHS. But do the current headlines fully capture how long patients are now waiting for NHS care?
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By Siva Anandaciva - 14 February 2018
Blog

Not to be sniffed at: flu vaccination for NHS staff

What more could the NHS do to improve flu vaccination uptake among staff? Bilal Sahib looks at the options.
By Bilal Sahib - 2 February 2018
Blog

Learning from human guinea pigs: creating open, supportive organisational cultures

Alex Baylis looks at how far research ethics have come in 50 years and reminds us of the importance of creating organisational cultures that put patients first and support staff to do the right thing.
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By Alex Baylis - 25 August 2017
Blog

Championing quality and seizing improvement opportunities: are we getting it right?

Durka Dougall argues that improving quality of care for patients and delivering better value care are often two sides of the same coin.
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By Durka Dougall - 28 June 2017
Blog

What have we learnt about keeping people safer?

Following our recent event on keeping people safer in the health and care system, David Naylor reflects on how the implementation gap between theory and practice can be narrowed.
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By David Naylor - 7 December 2016
Blog

Patient safety: closing the implementation gap

Dr Suzette Woodward, national campaign director for NHS England's Sign up to Safety campaign, reflects on the difficulty of introducing new methods to improve patient safety and what can be done to improve the success rate when it comes to putting theory into practice.
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By Suzette Woodward - 30 August 2016
Blog

What has the impact been of recent caps on NHS agency staff spend?

Four months since the first caps on NHS agency staff spend were introduced by Monitor and the NHS Trust Development Authority, Phoebe Dunn looks at the impact so far.
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By Phoebe Dunn - 23 March 2016
Blog

Real trust rather than regulated trust should be the foundation on which improvement in the NHS is built

A shift in emphasis, away from rules and regulation and towards developing positive organisational cultures that encourage risk taking and avoid blame, will be key as the NHS strives to improve quality
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By Professor Sir Chris Ham - 4 March 2016
Blog

Safe staffing in the NHS comes at a cost

When the Care Quality Commission suggested in its recent State of Care report that safer, better care does not necessarily cost more the inclusion of the word necessarily was important, says Helen McKenna.
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By Helen McKenna - 26 October 2015
Blog

Is the NHS delivering too much of the wrong things?

More health care is not always better health care. Sometimes the NHS delivers services that people don’t want or need: the problem of overuse.
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By Hugh Alderwick - 12 August 2015
Blog

Putting patient safety first: how long will it take before the NHS learns from its mistakes?

Candace Imison draws on some of the inspirational stories we heard at our 2013 Annual Conference to look at how the NHS could improve patient safety by learning from mistakes.
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By Candace Imison - 27 November 2013
Blog

Creating cultures that put patients first

The culture that patients are treated in is the one that we all work in, and if we are to learn from Francis and truly improve the NHS, it starts with us, says Donna Willis.
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By Donna Willis - 1 October 2013
Blog

Why do people find it so hard to speak out in the interests of patients?

Health care staff are usually motivated to enter their professions by a desire to make a difference for patients and service users. Why then, do they find it so hard to speak up for patients when they see care that does not meet satisfactory standards?
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By Bev Fitzsimons - 10 July 2013
Blog

The government’s response to Francis: will it lead to an improvement in quality of care?

Nigel Edwards shares his thoughts on the government's response to the Francis Inquiry report.
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By Nigel Edwards - 28 March 2013
Blog

First do no harm: lessons from service reconfiguration in London

What can we learn from service redesign in London? Chris Ham reflects on themes from our conference on progressing health care in the capital.
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By Professor Sir Chris Ham - 19 October 2012
Blog

Maternity wards need the right people in the right place at the right time

Could the situation in maternity care be improved if maternity services changed the way they use their current workforce? Natasha Curry explores in our blog.
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By Natasha Curry - 7 March 2011
Blog

Mid Staffordshire: a hospital that lost its way

Stephen Moss, Chair of Mid Staffordshire, spoke at our conference this week about the lessons he had learnt from the 'story of a hospital that lost its way'.
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By Joanna Goodrich - 14 December 2010
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