Thousands of patient safety incidents reported by hospitals

Incidents reported included mistakes during operations and problems with medication and equipment.

Other cases included patients slipping and falling and issues with medical records, scans and breaches of confidentiality.

Most of the incidents did not cause any harm to the patient involved but others led to serious injuries, problems or complications.

In some cases they were followed by a patient’s death although hospitals say this does not always mean the incident was the direct cause – particularly if a patient was already very ill.

Sometimes an incident is recorded as being followed by a patient’s death but further investigations show the two factors are not related.

The figures, published by NHS England, show the number of mistakes, accidents and other issues reported by hospitals between October 2015 and the end of March this year.

Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals NHS Trust reported one patient death following an incident while another person suffered severe harm.

A further 667 cases led to patients suffering low to moderate harm, while most, 4,110 caused no harm at all.

East Sussex Healthcare NHS Trust recorded 4,902 incidents, of which 13 were initially followed by reports of patient’s death.

Eighteen caused severe harm and 1,732 caused low or moderate harm.

Western Sussex Hospitals NHS Trust reported 4,271 incidents, nine of which were followed by a patient’s death and nine which caused severe harm.

An East Sussex Healthcare spokeswoman said: “We have an open and transparent culture and our staff are encouraged to declare incidents when they occur.

“Incidents are always reviewed and in some instances this is followed up with a detailed investigation during which the patient and family is kept fully informed.

“The figures published show that more than 99.3 per cent of incidents resulted in no permanent harm to patients.

“Local people should be reassured that a culture exists within the Trust to learn from incidents and minimise the risk of any reoccurrence.”

Western Sussex Hospital director of nursing and patient safety Amanda Parker said: “We want our staff to be alert to potential risks, not simply to react after someone has been hurt.

“The result of that open culture can be seen in these figures – the vast majority of the incidents reported by staff involved nobody coming to any harm.

“The overwhelming remainder of incidents resulted in low harm to patients. However, any harm is one too many and we want staff to prioritise patient safety above all else, and these findings show our staff are doing just that."