Clinical leadership in the provision of hospital care

doi:10.1136/bmj.330.7502.1219

BMJ 2005;330:1219-1220 (28 May), doi:10.1136/bmj.330.7502.1219

Editorial

Clinical leadership in the provision of hospital care

Must be improved to reduce basic errors in clinical care

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Throughout the developed world, direct observation and reviewsof patients' records reveal basic errors in the care of patients.A recent study from France showed that the oft quoted figureof 10% of adverse events arising from health care in hospitalsis probably an underestimate.¹ How can clinical leaders helpto solve these problems?

The first task for clinical leaders must be to make doctorsand nurses aware of such errors and to teach them to understandthe contributory factors. In the United Kingdom's NHS, all toooften there is insufficient contribution to acute care fromexperienced and fully trained staff. This is exemplified bya study that showed a fourfold difference in mortality frommajor general surgical procedures undertaken in a British hospitalcompared with surgical mortality in a US counterpart,² and byanother study that found that shortfalls in medical care contributedto 25 of 200 deaths occurring . . . [Full text of this article]

Sisse Olsen, research fellow

(s.olsen@imperial.ac.uk)

Graham Neale, visiting professor

Clinical Safety Research Unit, Academic Department of Surgery, Imperial College, St Mary's Hospital, London W2 1NY

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Rapid Responses:

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Leadership Support: F C Gray Southon
bmj.com, 27 May 2005 [Full text]
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bmj.com, 31 May 2005 [Full text]
Clinical leadership in the provision of hospital care: Norman A Matheson
bmj.com, 1 Jun 2005 [Full text]
The right kind of clinical leadership: Jan Walmsley
bmj.com, 2 Jun 2005 [Full text]
Re: The right kind of clinical leadership: Peter KK Au-Yeung
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