News and events

England’s 15 Patient Safety Collaboratives have played a key part in the national roll-out of pulse oximeters providing an early warning system for patients at risk of Covid-19. In just three months the number of England’s clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) with a fully operational COVID Oximetry @home pathway increased from 20% to 100%. During the […]

Innovative training to improve the safety of women and babies in low risk labour developed in the Thames Valley has won a national patient safety award. The practical online programme is the first to integrate real fetal heart sounds, making it more realistic for midwives and helping them to differentiate normal and abnormal heartbeats in […]

An e-learning programme aimed at maternity services is a finalist in three categories of the HSJ Patient Safety Awards. The Intelligent Intermittent Auscultation in Labour training is primarily for midwives in clinical practice and student midwives in training. The programme is unique because it uses ‘real’ fetal heart sounds to help improve the key midwifery […]

In the context of the rapidly changing COVID-19 pandemic, the Patient Safety Collaborative’s priority is to support our NHS and Social Care colleagues and providers. We are pausing some of our programmes that do not contribute directly to the COVID-19 national response and refocusing existing programmes. This includes changing our Deterioration and Maternity and Neonatal […]

In light of the latest Government advice, the Oxford AHSN is temporarily closing its offices. We are continuing to work remotely with our partners across the NHS, industry and universities. If you need to get in touch with us, please use our general email address: patientsafety@oxfordahsn.org – we will put you in touch with the right person. […]

A new national training programme created in the Oxford Patient Safety Collaborative region aims to improve safety for low-risk mothers and babies during labour and birth. The interactive e-learning package is the first to integrate real fetal heart sounds, helping midwives provide safer care when they monitor a baby’s heartbeat in the womb. This approach […]

One of the priorities of the Specialised Paediatric programme run by the Oxford Patient Safety Collaborative was to investigate incidents in the community involving children who use long-term ventilation. The findings of this important work have now been published in the BMJ’s ‘Archives of Diseases in Childhood’. Read the paper here. This research was also […]

One of the six projects which secured funding from our 2018 Safety Culture Fund has led to real improvements in the treatment of patients with sepsis. Milton Keynes University Hospital (MKUH) has improved sepsis-related handover and treatment time in its emergency department (ED). The average handover time from ambulance to ED nurse was cut from […]

A new paper has been published highlighting the impact of the award-winning Good Hydration! initiative to reduce urinary tract infections in care homes. Download a copy of the BMJ Open Quality paper here.  The initiative has led to fewer residents suffering UTIs which are closely associated with dehydration. The Good Hydration! initiative was designed to encourage […]