Launched last month at the Audrey Emerton lecture theatre, the DATIX system uses a simple online report form for all the various types of incidents. These are then recorded onto a centralised database. The advantages of the timesaving new system include the production of better quality data and the opportunity to speed up the way incidents are dealt with.

DATIX was founded by one of the UK’s leading healthcare law firms acting for hospitals and benefits from over twenty years’ experience of defending more than 20,000 claims arising from staff and patient safety incidents. It is the most widely used risk management software in the NHS with over 10,000 users in more than 400 trusts and other healthcare providers. DATIX creates a comprehensive picture of an organisation’s risks by integrating information from patient safety incidents with complaints, claims, PALS and Health and Safety incidents that affect staff and visitors as well as patients.

A large number of staff and members of the Patient and Public Involvement forum were among those present when an overview of the system was presented by Alan Birch, customer care and training Manager from DATIX. He also spoke about some new developments DATIX will be launching in the coming months.

Bart’s and The London NHS Trust’s DATIX manager Adam Nortman presented the roll out of the DATIX web based incident reporting system and highlighted the improvements the new system has helped to achieve, including:

• Accurate information quickly to line managers of serious incidents

• Improved reporting

• Timely report to external bodies
e.g. National Patient Safety Agency, the Health and Safety Executive etc.

• The ability for local managers to review and produce reports about locally reported incidents.

• Increased sharing of lessons learnt from these incidents proactively.

Lyn Allinson, the head of risk management for the trust and DATIX project lead summarised the imminent roll out this web based risk management system and named the trust lead for each module.

• Risk Register & Assurance Framework:
Lyn Allinson

• Claims and Inquest: Melinda Stone

• Incident and Web Form: Lyn Allinson, Mark Dunnett, Diane Mahoney
and Mark Renshaw

• Complaints: Paula Rabin

• PALS: Andrew Harvey

• Standards: Sue Lapwood