System failed child heart patients, says Milburn
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Your support makes all the difference.Child heart patients who died at Bristol Royal Infirmary were failed by a few people in senior positions in the hospital but even more so by the "very system that was supposed to make them well and keep them from harm", Health Secretary Alan Milburn told the Commons today.
Mr Milburn, announcing new measures, spoke out in a statement on the independent inquiry report, published today, into the Bristol heart scandal in which up to 35 babies under a year old died unnecessarily at the hospital between 1991 and 1995 as a result of sub-standard care.
He told MPs further action was needed to prevent a repeat of the "tragedy" at the hospital where "too many" children had died during open heart surgery.
Mr Milburn announced that he had appointed a national director of children's healthcare services, Al Aynsley-Green, Nuffield Professor of Child Health at Great Ormond Street Hospital, "with immediate effect".
"His priority will be to spearhead the faster development of the first-ever national standards for children's health services," Mr Milburn said.
He said information for patients, and specifically for parents, was being published about the questions they should ask before consenting to treatment for themselves or for their children.
Mr Milburn promised to "action" recommendations in the report to set up a new independent Office for Information on Healthcare Performance to coordinate data collection about medical outcomes.
There would also be an over-arching Council for the Regulation of Healthcare Professions to ensure individual professional regulatory bodies act in a consistent manner.
Mr Milburn said he would consider a recommendation to set up a new regulatory body for NHS managers.
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