Over a quarter of staff at Southmead Hospital’s health trust do not feel comfortable raising concerns about “unsafe clinical practice”, a report has revealed. Less than two-thirds of North Bristol NHS Trust (NBT) employees feel “safe” to speak up about anything while only half are confident that the organisation would do something about it.
NBT board members called the findings “very concerning” and pledged to step up the trust’s Freedom To Speak Up (FTSU) initiative, which encourages workers to flag issues and bosses to listen and take action. A report to the board said more concerns were being lodged as the scheme was gathering momentum, most about employee safety, including staffing levels, followed by “bullying and harassment”.
“Taken together this indicates that the vast number of concerns relate to behaviours and relationships,” it said. “Some concerns have recorded the knock-on effect to patient safety of issues of worker safety/bullying and harassment.”
