Medical Protection has welcomed the publication of two pieces of essential guidance from the Department of Health, providing healthcare professionals with timely advice on the important topics of incident reporting and complaints procedures.
The ‘National Guideline for ‘Patient Safety Incident Reporting and Learning in the Health Sector of South Africa’ and ‘National Guideline to Manage Complaints, Compliments and Suggestions in the Health Sector of South Africa’ have each been recently published by the Department, and provide an update to existing guidance.
Responding to the updated guidance, Dr Graham Howarth, Head of Medical Services – Africa at Medical Protection said: “We welcome the Department of Health’s decision to update its guidance on incident reporting as well as complaints procedures, and they both provide an excellent overview for healthcare professionals of the processes involved.
“Healthcare professionals want to provide the very best for their patients. However, as with any form of human endeavour, both incidents and complaints are inevitable.
“It is important that where incidents happen, they are identified early so that appropriate reporting and learning happens, helping to reduce the chance of such incidents being repeated. Medical Protection is pleased that healthcare professionals now have further updated guidance from the Department on how to manage and learn from incidents, and thus improve patient safety.
“Likewise, Medical Protection has called for a comprehensive complaints process for many years, and we are pleased to see this is being further refined. Processing complaints in a timely and professional manner is of paramount importance both for mitigating litigation, and for improving the patient experience.
“If Medical Protection members are in doubt about incident reporting, or the managing of complaints, they can contact us for advice.”
ENDS
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The Medical Protection Society Limited (“MPS”) is the world’s leading protection organisation for doctors, dentists and healthcare professionals. We protect and support the professional interests of more than 300,000 members around the world. Membership provides access to expert advice and support and can also provide, depending on the type of membership required, the right to request indemnity for any complaints or claims arising from professional practice.
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