13 May 2010

Dundee students nearing front of global drive on patient safety

(note - the students will be available for pics at the Ninewells event on Friday May 14th, details as in Notes To Editors below)

Students at the University of Dundee are proving to be among the world leaders in introducing patient safety elements into healthcare education.

Students across the Schools of Medicine, Dentistry, Nursing and Computing at the University have helped place Dundee second out of 210 chapters in the world with their involvement in the Institute for Healthcare Improvement Open School for health professions.

The US-based IHI Open School is an interprofessional educational community that gives students the skills to become champions for health care improvement, particularly in areas like quality improvement, patient safety, teamwork, leadership, and patient-centred care.

'Issues like patient safety and quality improvement are very much at the heart of healthcare, yet they haven’t really been core in the curriculum of healthcare-related education,' said Professor Peter Davey, of the Division of Clinical and Population Sciences and Education at the University of Dundee.

'The IHI Open School is helping students play a key role in boosting these areas of education, and I am absolutely delighted that our students in Dundee have taken this up so strongly and completed so many of the Open School courses, the second-most of anywhere in the world. By developing these skills, and then taking them into the professional environment, it will have a real impact on many areas of front-line healthcare.'

Two of the students who have helped drive the IHI programme in Dundee - Liam Shields (final year Nursing) and Tommy Johnston (final year Medicine) - have been invited to speak at major conferences and seminars around the world.

Their next engagement is closer to home as they have helped organise a conference in Dundee on Friday May 14th - 'Transforming Education on Patient Safety' - that will be attended by senior healthcare managers, clinicians and students from across Scotland. Their aim is to promote a nationwide strategy which will ensure all healthcare students in Scotland are educated in this vitally important subject area. They have already made considerable progress towards this after they challenged the leaders of Scottish education at a recent NHS Education for Scotland/Scottish Patient Safety Programme joint conference in Edinburgh on what steps they will take to ensure this becomes reality.

'This is something that has grown from a small group of students to national and international attention,' said Liam. 'We are now speaking to a lot of healthcare professionals about how this can be developed and incorporated further both in education and the professional sector.'

Tommy said the project was a great example of how initiatives can be led from the 'bottom up'.

'By making students patient safety 'champions' we are introducing a standard of non-technical skills and communication that can be applied across the health care sector,' said Tommy. 'It might be a bit daunting for a student to challenge a surgeon or senior consultant on things like pre-operation checklists and so on, but this programme is giving us the skills to do this in an effective and non-judgemental manner.

'If we really want to improve healthcare and make it safer for our patients it is vitally important all healthcare students are educated in quality and safety as part of the core undergraduate curriculum. The Dundee chapter is already making great progress towards achieving this but we still have a lot more work to do'

Their work is now being championed by those at the top of the healthcare system.

NHS Tayside Chief Operating Officer Mr Gerry Marr said, 'We are particularly pleased that this initiative is to focus on students at the start of their careers. This embeds patient safety in their work right from the start.

'The individual students are exemplary in this work and provide excellent role models for others.'

Heather Marr, Head of the Division of Quality Assurance and Academic Governance in the School of Nursing and Midwifery at Dundee, said, 'This is a hugely positive development and the students deserve great credit for adopting this so enthusiastically.'

For more information on the IHI Open School see: www.ihi.org/IHI/Programs/IHIOpenSchool/.

The student chapter website address is: www.ihi-dundee.org.uk/.

NOTES TO EDITORS

The 'Transforming Education on Patient Safety' open meeting takes place from 10am to 4 pm on Friday May 14th in Lecture Theatres 1 and 3 at Ninewells Hospital.

resentations and speakers include:

• Involving Patients: Carol Sinclair, Director of the National Patient Experience Programme 'Better Together'
• Working with Leaders in the NHS: Gerry Marr, Chief Operating Officer, Delivery Unit, NHS Tayside
• International Networking: Shannon Mills, IHI Open School, Sue Lister, NHS Institute for Improvement and Innovation, Rona Patey, Lead for Evaluation of the WHO Patient Safety Curriculum Guide
• Scottish Patient Safety Programme: Jason Leitch, National Clinical Lead; Kevin Rooney, SPSP Fellow for Integration of QI and Patient Safety in the Undergraduate Curricula
• NHS Education Scotland: Philip Cachia, Lead for Patient Safety Educational Framework
• Skills and Education in the Workplace: Claire Chalmers, Senior Lecturer, University of the West of Scotland; Jean Ker, Clinical Lead, Clinical Skills Managed Educational Network

There will be a Student Forum to allow students to network and to discuss key issues for discussion with the invited speakers.

For media enquiries contact:
Roddy Isles
Head, Press Office
University of Dundee
Nethergate, Dundee, DD1 4HN
TEL: 01382 384910
E-MAIL: r.isles@dundee.ac.uk
MOBILE: 07800 581902