With public trust in healthcare organizations dropping, clinical laboratories worldwide must work doubly hard to provide competent, secure services to their patients
Is the UK’s National Health Service hurting people? About 10% of NHS patients said yes in a recent survey conducted by the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) and the University of Oxford. And those findings are a public stain on the physicians and clinical laboratories in an already strained healthcare system.
Of the 10,000 people interviewed, nearly 1,000 “reported they had experienced harm caused by the NHS in the previous three years. Of those, 6.2% cited their treatment or care and 3.5% blamed the harm on a lack of access to NHS services,” according to an LSHTM news release.
While the definition of “hurt” within the confines of the survey wasn’t specified, what is clear is that public trust in the UK’s healthcare system is decreasing. Fallout from the survey may affect the public’s trust in clinical labs that are facing unfavorable feedback from slow test result delivery times or rare instances of incorrect results.
“I’ve been studying patient safety and working in and with the NHS, including as a GP, for many years. It’s a complex challenge to pinpoint the cause of the problem and solve it,” said study author Helen Hogan, PhD, MBBS, a general practitioner and associate professor in the department of Health Services Research and Policy at LSHTM, in the news release.
The researchers published their findings in the journal BMJ Quality and Safety titled, “Patient-reported Harm from NHS Treatment or Care, or the Lack of Access to Care: A Cross-Sectional Survey of General Population Prevalence, Impact, and Responses.”
“These findings indicate that healthcare harm affects a considerable number of the general public. It shows that there is still some way to go to improve safety across the NHS,” said study author Helen Hogan, PhD, MBBS, general practitioner and associate professor in the department of Health Services Research and Policy at LSHTM, in a news release. (Photo copyright: London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.)
LSHTM Survey Details
Slightly more than 10,000 patients in Great Britain took part in the cross-sectional survey, which was funded by the National Institute for Health Research Policy Program.
Of the 9.7% that reported NHS harm, 6.2% claimed it was from the actual treatment or care given and 3.5% from the access to care. Severity ranged from 37.6% reporting moderate impact to 44.8% reporting severe impact, and the majority claimed the impact occurred at hospitals, the authors wrote in BMJ Quality and Safety.
Women led the respondents in reports of harm, and more severe harm or higher rates of harm were reported from those in disadvantaged groups or lower social grades and those with disabilities or long-term illness, according to the researchers.
Though 60% got professional support for their troubles, including 11.6% contacting the NHS’ Patient Advice and Liaison Service (PALS), only 17% made a formal complaint. A small percentage, 2.5%, sought financial compensation, the survey showed.
Poor Patient Service Experience
Further, the patients reported poor results when they sought relief from the harm. Some (44.4%) desired treatment or care to help with the harm, while others (34.8%) wanted an explanation for the harm. Two-thirds said their incidents were not dealt with well and only half reported a positive PALS experience, the survey noted.
“Those harmed by healthcare are looking for a compassionate and caring response from services. What they really want is to be listened to, to have their harm acknowledged, and get an explanation,” noted Michele Peters, PhD, fellow survey author and associate professor at Oxford Population Health, University of Oxford, in the LSHTM news release.
Loss in Confidence
To make matters worse for the UK’s publicly run healthcare system, an unrelated patient satisfaction survey published contemporaneously found that NHS satisfaction hit record lows. According to The Guardian, the annual patient survey found a 24% decrease in satisfaction among adults in Britain in how NHS is run (now at a mere 21%). Dissatisfaction rose from 52% to 59% in the past year.
General practice, accident and emergency, and dental care were the areas of biggest disappointment, the study revealed.
“It is by far the most dramatic loss of confidence in how the NHS runs that we have seen in 40 years of this survey,” said Mark Dayan, a policy analyst at the Nuffield Trust who was engaged by The King’s Fund to analyze the survey data.
“There is a need to better understand the patient perspective following harm and for further consideration of what a person-centered approach to resolution and recovery might look like,” the researchers noted in BMJ Quality and Safety.
These types of findings can contribute to public mistrust of healthcare organizations worldwide, including clinical laboratories and pathology groups. It’s worth watching how the NHS resolves these issues.
—Kristin Althea O’Connor