Improving safety of handover

 In May 2010, The Health Foundation outlined a number of recommendations for improving the quality of clinical handover, which included:

• A standardised handover format including an agreed time and place.
• Streamlining shift patterns for different staff groups, and insisting on bleep-free time during handover, so that this handover format can be put into practice.
• Developing team-based handovers to improve communication.
• Providing training in non-technical skills.
• Progressing towards a proactive, pathway-driven culture.

At the conference, Jo Bibby, director of improvement programmes, The Health Foundation, will deliver a presentation on improving patient safety, learning from the safer patients initiative, while outlining current priorities for improvement.

Dr Ken Catchpole, senior post-doctoral scientist at the Quality, Reliability, Safety and Teamwork Unit, University of Oxford, will also discuss managing complex clinical handover in a systematic way, with a focus on learning from outside the NHS and other high risk industries.

Delegates will have the opportunity to hear from a series of healthcare professionals on their experiences of clinical handover including: improving patient safety, the junior doctor perspective and learning from revised handover, in line with the “Hospital at Night Programme”.

Professor Iain Carpenter, associate director and clinical lead on record standards, Health Informatics Unit, The Royal College of Physicians, will conclude the conference with an update from the RCP survey about how handover could be improved.

The conference is recognised by the IHM and Good Governance Institute; approved by the Association of Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland; and accredited by the Royal College of Physicians and Royal College of Nursing. For more information, contact: Stephen on 020 8541 1399 or email Stephen@healthcare-events.co.uk