BMJ  2007;334:278 (10 February), doi:10.1136/bmj.39118.686100.DB

News

Care of dying patients and safety dominate report on NHS complaints

Susan Mayor

1 London

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

Complaints about the care of dying patients and patient safety dominate a report published last week that reviewed complaints referred to the Healthcare Commission, the NHS watchdog in England.

The report analysed 16 000 complaints sent to the commission for independent review between July 2004 and July 2006. More than half (54%) of complaints about hospitals were about care surrounding a death. In many cases, families complained that they had received contradictory or confusing information from different staff caring for a relative. In other cases, relatives felt that they were unprepared for the death or had no time to arrange for family members to be present.

Nearly one quarter (22%) of total complaints were about patient safety. One of the most serious incidents was a mix up over names leading to a child having the wrong injection.

In relation to primary care, the biggest concern was about misdiagnosis or delays . . . [Full text of this article]


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Complore Complore   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us   Add to Digg Digg   Add to Reddit Reddit   Add to Technorati Technorati    What's this?

This article has been cited by other articles:

  • Workman, S. (2007). Researching a good death. BMJ 334: 485-486 [Full text]  
Access jobs at BMJ Careers
Whats new online at Student BMJ