Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment the Department has made of the number of patients who are avoidably harmed during routine medical procedures and surgeries.

The National Reporting and Learning System (NRLS) provides a national database of reported patient safety incidents for the National Health Service in England. This data is published as official statistics alongside commentary. Within NRLS data, it is not possible to determine easily if the reported incidents took place during medical procedures and surgery that can be considered ‘routine’. The most recent publication for 2021/22 was published in October 2022 and available at the following link:

https://www.england.nhs.uk/patient-safety/national-patient-safety-incident-reports/national-patient-safety-incident-reports-13-october-2022/

The total number of patient safety incidents reported was 2,345,815. Most incidents are reported as causing no harm, 70.6% or low harm, 26.0%. Fewer than 4% of incidents reported caused higher degrees of harm, of which 0.5% were categorised as severe harm or death. NHS England reviews information in these two categories to characterise new, emerging and under-recognised risks and determine how they might be addressed.

The Learn from Patient Safety Events service will this year fully replace the NRLS. It will change the way information is collected to make it easier for providers to record and learn from patient safety incidents.

The Government continues to pursue higher patient safety standards and a transparent, learning culture in order to support the NHS to achieve continuous improvement in safety and to reduce harmful events happening in the first place.