Demoralised doctors say patient safety is worse than a year ago

PATIENT safety has deteriorated in the past year, according to doctors, with most medics fearing danger to NHS patients in the next 12 months.

Nearly two-thirds of doctors (64 per cent) said patient safety had become worse, a survey for The Royal College of Physicians found, compared to 54 per cent when the survey was conducted last year.

Four out of five (80 per cent) are worried about the ability of their service to deliver safe patient care in the next 12 months. Even more (84 per cent) believe that the workforce is demoralised by the increasing pressures upon the NHS.

The report, NHS Reality Check Update 2018, gave more than 1,500 doctors in England, Wales and Northern Ireland the same questions they were given a year ago – and their responses indicated that the situation had become worse in nearly all areas of care.

Doctors’ responses included one who said: “Staff simply cannot deliver what is expected of them under current circumstances.

“We are not robots. We are human beings with limits.”