MPS and DPL comment on encouraging candour through professional regulation
Post date: 28/08/2013 | Time to read article: 1 minsThe information within this article was correct at the time of publishing. Last updated 18/05/2020
MPS and DPL respond to the call for information on ‘How can professional regulation encourage healthcare professionals and social workers to be more candid when care goes wrong?’
We welcome this work by the Professional Standards Authority on encouraging candour amongst healthcare professionals following the Francis Inquiry.
MPS fully supports the focus of the Francis Inquiry Report on the need to achieve an open culture in the NHS. The report rightly identifies that there is a culture of fear in the NHS and a need to tackle the reluctance of healthcare professionals to be open with patients, as well as colleagues, when things go wrong.
However, MPS has for several years expressed concerns about a statutory duty of candour, that is now being introduced, and we remain of the view that a legal duty will not be effective at providing the impetus needed to change behaviour in the NHS. We understand the appeal to the public and others of using regulation to mandate openness but think that this will be ineffective and prove a distraction from the real task of developing an open culture in healthcare.
Only through cultural change can we alter healthcare professionals reactions to incidents from one of fear into an eagerness to report, explain and learn from what happened.
