The House of Commons public accounts committee is “appalled” that the NHS has at least 15000 cases of clinical negligence on its books, and the total could be much more, according to its report last week on NHS financial management.
The report on the 1997-8 NHS expenditure for England revealed that £79m ($126m) had been paid out that year on negligence cases, with outstanding liabilities estimated at £2.8 bn.
The MPs' watchdog on public spending said that such cases represented a “tragedy” for the people involved and the figure for outstanding liabilities was “a significant drain on stretched health care resources.”
In evidence to the committee, Alan Langlands, head of the NHS Executive, had estimated that the total of current cases was somewhere between the 15000 allowed for under its accounting provisions and the 80000 suggested by the charity Action for Victims of Medical Accidents.
The committee noted a range of initiatives designed to improve clinical standards, including clinical governance, the National Institute of Clinical Excellence, the Commission for Health Improvement, and proposals for all doctors to undergo revalidation. The success of these initiatives was “crucial in stemming this enormous drain on scarce NHS resources,” it said.
Full story in News Extra, at www.bmj.com.