21 Jul 2005
Dr Gill Morgan, Chief Executive of the NHS Confederation which represents more than 90% of NHS organisations, said: "More than one million patients are cared for every day by NHS staff in England and Wales and their treatment goes smoothly for the overwhelming majority of those patients.
"It is vitally important that, when things do go wrong in a minority of cases, we learn from our mistakes and ensure they don't happen again and so we support the publication of today's NPSA report which provides the first real estimate of the scale of the challenge.
"We welcome the NPSA's conclusion that the number of hospital patients who die as a result of patient safety incidents is far lower than previous estimates - 840 rather than 40,000 per year - although the data included in the report should be treated with caution.
"Today's report is certainly no cause for complacency especially since, as this new system for reporting incidents becomes routine and more incidents are reported, we would expect the headline figures of patient safety incidents to increase."
ENDS
The NHS Confederation represents more than 90% of the organisations that make up the NHS throughout the UK. Its members include the majority of NHS trusts, foundation trusts, primary care trusts and health authorities in England; trusts and local health boards in Wales; NHS boards and special boards in Scotland; and health and social service trusts and boards in Northern Ireland.
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Last reviewed 9 Nov 2006