Brown promises to unlock NHS data
Gordon Brown has promised to “radically open up data and public information.” Launching the ‘Putting the frontline first: smarter government’ report, Brown said “great detail” about how hospitals perform would be put online during 2010. He said the information would “encourage feedback and dialogue between professional and citizen” and help “to benchmark the best and […]
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Dr Foster names safety underperformers
The Dr Foster Hospital Guide 2009 has named 12 NHS trusts that it says have significantly underperformed on its new measure of patient safety. The guide, published over the weekend, identifies patient safety as the single most important element of hospital care. For the first time, it has introduced a Patient Safety Score, awarding scores of one to […]
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Barcoded wristbands compulsory by 2011
The Information Standards Board for Health and Social Care has called for patients to wear barcoded wristbands and for trusts that do not comply by July 2011 to be penalised. An advanced notification of a new information standard has been sent out by the ISB that would define the procedures necessary to add barcodes to patient wristbands […]
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CQC criticises discharge summaries
The Care Quality Commission has warned that the NHS may be failing to prevent harm to patients by failing to share information when they move between services. The findings come in a report by the watchdog called ‘Managing patients’ medicines after discharge from hospital’, based on a national study that visited 12 primary care trusts […]
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CQC warns on registration
The Care Quality Commission has warned that many trusts have significant work ahead of them to improve their performance, if they are to register with the regulator next year. The warning comes as the CQC publishes its NHS Annual Health Check, which gives performance ratings to all 392 acute, primary care and specialist trusts in England. Although more organisations […]
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NPSA: unsure if wristband target met
The National Patient Safety Agency has said a technical problem means it is unable to establish whether its target to make sure that all patients in England and Wales have printed wristbands has been met. In July 2007, the NPSA said it wanted to see all wristbands being printed by 18 July this year, to cut the danger of […]
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