Statement from Dr Rosie Benneyworth, Interim Chief Executive Officer at the Health Services Safety Investigations Body (HSSIB):
"We welcome the publication of the Quality Strategy and its recognition that safety is the foundation of high-quality care. The important role that the National Quality Board now has in providing strategic leadership, improving coordination across the system and creating a more coherent approach to quality and safety provides a significant opportunity to improve patient care. Strong national leadership, combined with a culture of learning and psychological safety, will be critical if the NHS is to move from reacting to harm to anticipating and preventing it.
"While we welcome the strategy’s vision of a quality management system for the NHS, our investigations continue to identify that too often, risks are recognised too late, warning signs are missed, and opportunities to learn are lost. If we are to make a meaningful improvement in patient safety, we must move beyond reacting to harm and strengthen how safety is managed across the system. There remain opportunities available for a safety management system to offer a practical way of achieving this to help organisations understand risk, put effective controls in place, strengthen accountability and support continuous learning and improvement.
"HSSIB looks forward to the publication of the Quality Management Systems Framework. However, given the Quality Strategy’s recognition that safety is the foundation of high-quality care, we are disappointed that it does not set out the need for an integrated management system. As the Strategy acknowledges, quality management and safety management require different but connected approaches, which should be brought together. HSSIB therefore welcomes the intention to review the NHS Patient Safety Strategy following publication of the Quality Strategy, particularly in its aims to enable real-time monitoring and management of risks as patients move through the system. These components should form part of an integrated quality and safety management system.
"We support the strategy’s ambition to improve clinical outcomes, reduce unwarranted variation and tackle health inequalities. We also support its emphasis on openness, learning and improvement. Creating the conditions where staff can speak up, share concerns and learn without fear of blame is essential to delivering safer care.
"For patients, families and NHS staff, this is about more than processes or structures. It is about creating a healthcare system that identifies risks earlier, listens when concerns are raised, learns when things go wrong, and acts before harm occurs. By improving outcomes, reducing inequalities and strengthening how safety is managed, we have an opportunity to deliver safer, more effective care and better experiences for everyone who relies on NHS services."
