Patient safety incidents
A patient safety incident is defined as any unintended or unexpected incident which could have or did lead to harm for one or more patients receiving NHS care. This includes:
• incidents that caused no harm or minimal harm
• incidents with a more serious outcome
• prevented patient safety incidents (known as ‘near misses’).
The number of incidents reported during 2012/22 remained high, however most patient safety incidents resulted in no harm to the patient demonstrating that the Trust has a good culture in regard to reporting incidents, not only when harm has been caused, but also to alert to the Trust that a near miss has occurred to ensure proactive steps can be taken to reduce the risk going forwards.
The chart below shows the number of patient safety incidents reported versus our activity during the year.
All NHS organisations have a responsibility to report any safety incidents relating to patients through the National Reporting and Learning Service (NRLS). The table below shows the latest published data of the number of incidents reported by EEAST vs the national average and the highest and lowest ambulance trust scores.
| Indicator | February 2021 to January 2022 - Latest comparable data published | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| EEAST | National average | Highest ambulance Trust count | Lowest ambulance Trust count | |
| Number of reported patient safety incidents that resulted in severe harm or death | 21 | 55 | 65 | 5 |
| Number of patient safety incidents reported within the Trust | 1,577 | 2,356 | 9,273 | 530 |
| Percentage severe harm or death incidents of total | 1.3% | 2.3% | 12.26% | 0.17% |
N.B. High and low data does not always relate to the same organisation.