Health secretary encourages whistleblowing

The Rt. Hon. Jeremy Hunt MP yesterday spoke about the increasing need for transparency within the NHS and encouraged more whistleblowing at the Patient Safety Congress. When asked if he would you be willing to consider a public enquiry on whistleblowing, Hunt said: “We are looking right now at what we can do about whistleblowing, that is perhaps the one last bit of the Francis jigsaw that we need to put in place. It’s an area where we need to do much better.”

Hunt also said: “We have to create the culture where people on the front line are encouraged and able to speak out if they see things that concern them – we need to make it easy for whistleblowing.”

Focusing on the need for more transparent data to be publicly available from the NHS, Hunt also announced that new, more easily digestible data on hospital safety data that will soon be available on NHS Choices, which is due to launch at the end of June.

NHS England Director of Nursing Hilary Garratt also spoke at Patient Safety Congress, saying: “We can’t go through another Mid Staffs or Winterbourne,” as she revealed plans for a new ‘Sign up to Safety’ campaign, due to launch in June.

In a bid to save 6,000 lives over three years, NHS trusts will have to demonstrate a continued commitment to putting patient safety first, learning and greater transparency. Paralleling Hunt’s announcement, she confirmed that the NHS Choices website will display hospital level patient safety data visible to patients and the public for the first time.