The Trust which runs Shropshire’s two acute hospitals is taking steps to improve care following the reporting of a number of ‘never events’.
The Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust (SaTH) has reported six never events since September 2015, following a period of more than three years without recording any.
Never events are described as events that are preventable because systems should be in place to prevent them from occurring.
No patients suffered serious harm as a result of the incidents, but clinical leaders at SATH said that a detailed review of each case was under way to reduce the risk of similar problems in the future.
In a joint statement Dr Edwin Borman, Medical Director, and Sarah Bloomfield, Director of Nursing and Quality, said: “We are very concerned that we have had these never events that, by definition, should not occur and show that our clinical processes have not been as good as they should have been.
“We apologise unreservedly to the patients who have been involved and assure them that we will be learning from each of these cases in order to ensure that we minimise the risk of similar problems happening again.
“It is particularly disappointing that we have had these never events after more than three years of none at all in our Trust. This has meant that we have initiated a detailed review of what exactly happened, how the problems occurred, how we could have prevented those problems, what we can learn from each of these cases and what we need to do in order to prevent further such events.
“We have reported each of these cases to NHS Improvement and have contacted nationally renowned colleagues to learn from them how we can improve care in our Trust following these events.
“A paper will be taken to our Trust Board in which we shall show what work already has been done and our commitment to improving care in the future.”