Risk management implementation programmes

Retrospective assessment of claims handled in recent years by the Medical Defence Union in the United Kingdom underlines the fact that administrative negligence in the health services as well as claims relating to nursing and midwifery were not less prominent than claims relating to purely clinical fault. However, more systematic study is needed, not merely of actual claims and injuries but also of faults in any part of the health care system which could have led to injury, irrespective of whether or not they actually did so. Such investigations, including enquiry into causal factors, will be an essential element in raising the awareness of health care staff to the possibility of inadvertent harm and in developing means to avoid and limit injury. On present evidence the prospects for an improvement in the overall situation and in a reduction in claims seem promising.