Patient safety

RCPCH Patient Safety Portal is our dedicated website to all things related to patient safety. Explore patient safety theory, learn about the NHS patient safety syllabus, share ideas for QI and get summaries of the latest alerts and reports.

News

Driving safer transfusions with SHOT - patient safety spotlight

13 November 2025

Since 1996, the UK’s Serious Hazards of Transfusion (SHOT) haemovigilance scheme has analysed safety incidents, revealing that children are disproportionately affected by errors and reactions.

Resource

Paediatric patient safety partnership RCPCH-NIHR SafetyNet - webinar recording 2025

RCPCH and NIHR Patient Safety Research Collaboration Network, SafetyNet, co-hosted this webinar on World Patient Safety Day on 17 September 2025. Experts such as Dr Peter Lachman considered the challenges in paediatric patient safety and how to respond to them. We also gave an overview of how both o...

Patient safety

News

Paediatric Early Warning System (PEWS) updates from the UK nations - patient safety spotlight

23 June 2025

Colleagues share the journey of the PEWS programmes in Scotland, Northern Ireland, Wales, and England, reflecting on standardising across the many and varied types of units, and future plans for improvement across the nations.

News

Learning from Ryan’s Rule in Australia - patient safety guest blog

28 April 2025

Professor Nitin Kapur, who spoke at this year's RCPCH Conference, reflects on the implementation of Ryan’s Rule in Queensland a decade ago - as we here in the UK tentatively roll out Martha’s rule in our units.

News

From the RCPCH Conference 2025 – patient safety spotlight

23 April 2025

A month on from the College’s conference in Glasgow (and online), our patient safety team of clinicians and staff recall the many inspiring and practical presentations and workshops on this theme.

Document

Martha's Rule - about

Martha’s Rule, now being piloted in England, enables staff, patients and their families to seek an independent medical review if they feel their concerns about a patient’s care are not being adequately addressed. This page explains the Rule and how it will be implemented across the UK, and will be r...

Patient safety

News

On Martha's Rule - patient safety spotlight

24 February 2025

By establishing patients' right to an independent review, this new rule now being tested in pilot sites across the country, can improve our ability as health professionals to recognise and respond to deterioration. We look at what this means for infants, children and young people.

News

From Groundhog Day to growth - patient safety spotlight

11 December 2024

What does the annual HSJ Patient Safety Congress, where health professionals discuss current and future challenges in safety improvement, mean for children, young people and their families and for those working in paediatrics? Jonathan Bamber, Head of Quality Improvement and Dr Emma Vittery, QI Fell...

News

RCPCH corporate witnesses to provide evidence to Thirlwall Inquiry

10 December 2024

The Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health (RCPCH) will be providing evidence to the Thirlwall Inquiry on 12 December 2024.

News

Forging ahead - President's update

13 September 2024

We may be young as a Royal College, but with more than 23,000 members globally, we are achieving so much together. Steve is pleased to see our concerns reflected in this week's Darzi review into the NHS in England, which were detailed in our own 'blueprint'.