NHS: Staff

(asked on 1st July 2015) - View Source

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, if he will publish the (a) evidence received by, (b) findings and (c) initial recommendations of NICE on its draft guidelines on (i) accident and emergency, (ii) community and (iii) mental health staffing levels.


Answered by
 Portrait
Ben Gummer
This question was answered on 9th July 2015

The Government is committed to supporting National Health Service trusts to put in place safe and sustainable levels of staffing by using their resources as effectively as possible for patients.

Following the Inquiry by Sir Robert Francis into the failings at Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust a joint commissioning letter from the Department and NHS England, was sent on 15 November 2013 to the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE).

The NICE safe staffing guidance is part of the overall approach to safe staffing which is intended to help make the NHS the safest healthcare system in the world. NHS organisations are using it to support their decision making in respect of staffing levels.

The existing NICE guidance on ‘Safe staffing for nursing in adult inpatient wards in acute hospitals’ (July 2014) and ‘Safe Midwife Staffing in Maternity Settings’ (January 2015) will continue to be used by NHS trusts and will remain important parts of their approach to ensuring safe and high quality care. NICE has said it will leave material already put in the public domain on its website. Draft evidence for Safe Staffing guidelines on Accident and Emergency, collected by NICE has also been published on their website. NICE had not drafted guidelines on community settings and mental health.

The work undertaken by NICE has provided an important foundation for the further work now to be led from within NHS England. NHS England, working with NICE and other national organisations, will now take this work forward for other areas of care and other healthcare professional groups. This work will bring together the focus on safe staffing with the development of new models of care, as set out in the Five Year Forward View.

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