Thank you Richard for sharing this very interesting 'preview' of your presentation at the World Patient Safety Day Global Conference next month (September).
I agree totally with your 'New rules to redesign and improve care', which all fall under the 'Protecting Patients' half of the aim of the 12-Pillar Clinical Governance programme (12-PCGP) which we developed in 2004. It can also be classed as Patients Rights, but it falls short of the full aim of 12-PCGP, which is, 'Protecting Patients, Supporting Practitioners In Tandem'.
I believe that you may have captured the following points already, but if you have not, please permit me to suggest that you consider and possibly add them. They are based on our experience of implementing the 12-PCGP:
i) it is crucial to also educate patients of 'Patient Responsibilities', so that they know that their carers / practitioners/providers are more likely to deliver all their Rights as patients better when they (carers / etc) feel safe in the presence of patients and there is mutual respect and trust between them and the patient / family. A situation that we read and hear of increasing physical, psychological and other forms of violence and threats to practitioners including murder cannot lead to achieving quality and safe care.
ii) to fulfill the second half of the aim of the 12-Pillar Clinical Governance programme, consider and add that it is crucial to 'support practitioners' in tandem with protecting patients. Safe work environment, adequate remuneration, provision of appropriate and adequate tools for work, employment of adequate number of human beings for the work, etc are all ways of supporting health workers to deliver quality and safer care.
In short, ensuring that Patients Rights including the 'right of access to their own data' is very important, but, so are educating patients to know and observe their responsiiblilies, and 'Supporting the Practitioners' in the widest possible sense. Doing one while falling short on the other does not lead to Patient Safety and Satisfaction.
Regards,
Joseph Ana
HIFA Profile: Joseph Ana is the Lead Senior Fellow/Medical Consultant at the Centre for Clinical Governance Research and Patient Safety (CCGR&PS) with Headquarters in Calabar, Nigeria, established by HRI Global (former HRIWA). He is the Country Coordinator for PACK Nigeria (Practical Approach to Care Kit) which is specifically designed to improve clinical competence (improving accuracy of diagnosis and treatment) in primary health care. He is also a Member of the World Health Organisation’s Technical Advisory Group on Integrated Care in primary, emergency, operative, and critical care (TAG-IC2). As the Cross River State Commissioner for Health (2004-2008), Joseph Ana led the introduction of the evidence based, homegrown quality tool, the 12-Pillar Clinical Governance Programme (12-PCGP) in Nigeria, which also suitable for lower-, low-, and middle income countries (LLMIC) with similar weak health sector and system. To ensure sustainability of 12-PCGP, the ‘Department of Clinical Governance, Servicom & e-health’ was established in Cross River State Ministry of Health in 2007. His main interest is in ‘Whole health sector and system strengthening in LLMICs’. He has written six books on the 12-Pillar Clinical Governance Programme, including the TOOLS manual for its Implementation, currently in its 2nd Edition. He served as Chairman of the Nigerian Medical Association’s Standing Committee on Clinical Governance (2012-2022), and he won the Association’s ‘Award of Excellence’ on three consecutive occasions for the innovation of 12-PCGP in Nigeria. He served as Chairman, Quality & Performance subcommittee of the Technical Working Group for the implementation of the Nigeria Health Act 2014. He was Member, National Tertiary Health Institutions Standards Committee (NTISC) of the Federal Ministry of Health, 2017-2022. He is the pioneer Secretary General/Trustee-Director of the Charity, NMF (Nigerian Medical Forum UK) which took the BMJ to West Africa in 1995. Joseph is a member of the HIFA Steering Group; the HIFA working group on Community Health Workers, and the Working Group on HIFA-WHO Collaboration (http://www.hifa.org/support/members/joseph-0 http://www.hifa.org/people/steering-group). Email: info AT hri-global.org and jneana AT yahoo.co.uk
