The Francis Report into the deaths at Mid-Staffordshire NHS Trust highlighted the problems facing the NHS when patients, families, clinicians and nurses are not heard, and where the management, leadership and ensuing culture are focused on the system's business, not patient care. This paper, the first in a series based on the implications of the Francis Report, provides the background and context for the subsequent ‘perspective’ articles from a range of relevant stakeholders and care-providers. The overriding message is that in all areas of healthcare, dentistry included, the quality of patient care, especially patient safety, must be placed above all other aims.
Clinical Relevance: The overriding importance of patient-centredness and quality of care, above all other aims, is the key message of clinical relevance from the Francis Report.
Article
Numerous media reports in recent years have highlighted significant lapses in quality of care across the full spectrum of medical and social welfare settings. Such reports result in a significant loss of trust by members of the public in services that exist to support and look after them. In many cases, investigations and public enquiries have followed reports of failings in these settings, but little seemed to change.
In 2010, however, Robert Francis QC published his report into the significant problems identified by patients and their relatives at the Mid-Staffordshire NHS Trust.1 This report showed starkly the level to which care standards could slip for patients in a modern-day NHS hospital. The transcripts of relatives' descriptions of the appalling lack of care and respect to which their family members were exposed make very distressing reading. This is an example from December 2007:
‘The patient was admitted to Ward 11 at Stafford Hospital, where her family were shocked to find that after four days they were not given any information regarding her treatment. Only after several requests from her daughter was a meeting arranged. One night the patient urinated in her bed three times as she was unable to reach the buzzer, when she tried to move from her bed as she received no response from the buzzer she suffered a sprained ankle.
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