At Cleveland Clinic London, it is our priority to care for all patients in a way that is compassionate, effective and safe. We aim to provide outstanding care, meeting individual needs and ensuring high levels of patient satisfaction.
Cleveland Clinic London has implemented a robust Clinical Governance Framework that sets out the approach to maintaining and improving quality and safety. This framework supports our commitment to delivering the highest standard of care to every patient. We promote a culture of Continuous Improvement (CI), always seeking to learn and get better.
We achieve this by:
- Fostering a culture that promotes openness and learning
- Using audits and patient feedback to continually assess the quality and effectiveness of care and services
- Learning from errors to implement improvements and reduce the risk of recurrence
- Maintaining effective risk management processes to proactively minimise risks to patients, visitors and caregivers
- Sharing successes and celebrating outstanding practice
Patient Safety
Your comfort and safety are our top priority, and our caregivers are dedicated to looking after you. There are also a few basic steps you can take to maintain your safety during your hospital stay.
Learn how we’re keeping you safe in hospital.
Our patient safety incident response plan
We are pleased to present our Patient Safety Incident Response Framework (PSIRF) — a national initiative designed to improve patient safety by guiding how healthcare providers should respond to patient safety incidents. PSIRF outlines how we will learn from these incidents to improve the quality and safety of our care and the experiences of patients, families and carers. Our plan is adaptable, considering each unique situation and the needs of those affected.
Medical Practitioners Assurance Framework (MPAF)
Cleveland Clinic London is committed to openness, transparency, and placing patient safety and quality at the heart of everything we do. As part of this, we have implemented the Medical Practitioners Assurance Framework (MPAF), which aims to help strengthen systems governing the conduct of medical practitioners in the independent healthcare sector.
MPAF was published by the Independent Healthcare Providers Network (IHPN), the representative body for independent healthcare providers, in autumn 2019. It was developed under the leadership of Professor Sir Bruce Keogh, former National Medical Director at NHS England, and is supported by an Expert Advisory Group. This includes representation from Spire and other acute independent providers, as well as the Patients Association, regulators and other independent bodies.
MPAF sets out best practice in four areas:
- Clinical governance structures
- Monitoring patient safety
- Appraisals of medical practitioners
- Raising and responding to concerns
We fully support MPAF and are confident that we are compliant with its principles. For example:
- Any practitioner working with Cleveland Clinic London can raise concerns through our network of Freedom to Speak Up Guardians.
- We submit data to a number of national audits and registries, and we are committed to sharing more widely.
Safeguarding
Cleveland Clinic London is fully committed to providing the highest standards of safeguarding practice.
We consider safeguarding to be the responsibility of all caregivers, both clinical and non-clinical. We discharge our safeguarding duties and provide assurance of this to the Care Quality Commission (CQC), which has registered Cleveland Clinic London to provide care. All staff have a duty of care to share concerns about patient or staff welfare if they believe they are suffering or likely to suffer harm.
The safeguarding responsibilities of Cleveland Clinic London — encompassing children, young people and adults at risk — assure the provision of safe, high-quality care for all those who entrust us with their care. As the legal frameworks, national policy and evidence change, we review our safeguarding provision regularly to ensure it is relevant and in line with our national and local authority agencies. We ensure that the duties and principles of safeguarding young people, children and adults are applied diligently and consistently using a holistic approach. We respect the need for patient autonomy and support the empowerment of patients’ right to make individual decisions.
Cleveland Clinic London works closely with agencies to deliver safeguarding responsibilities collectively, allowing us to help those needing support.
Patient Experience
Feedback
We strive to provide outstanding and compassionate care and service through every step of your journey. Whether you are a patient or visitor to Cleveland Clinic London, we value your feedback. We always like to know our patients are comfortable and well cared for. If you feel your visit was a particularly positive experience, we would be delighted to hear from you.
A patient experience survey will be provided to all patients after every hospital stay, procedure and visit to help us continuously monitor and improve our service. Our questionnaires are available in all patient rooms via a QR code scan on any personal smartphone or tablet. Tablets to access these can also be obtained from the nursing stations on each floor and in our outpatient centres. Each questionnaire is read and recorded, with action taken as required.
Speak with your department manager
Each clinical department has a manager. Please speak with them directly if you experience any issues. They are always happy to help.
Concerns and complaints
If you’re a Cleveland Clinic London patient, caregiver or a member of the public, please let us know as soon as possible if you have any concerns with our facilities or anyone working in them.
We hope you will feel comfortable raising your concern openly, but also appreciate that you may want to do so confidentially. Please be aware that there are circumstances where we may be required to disclose your identity by law or in the wider public interest. This may be the case, for example, if there are safeguarding concerns, alleged fraud or an issue that requires investigation by an external authority, such as the police.
We recognise that there are times when things go wrong. When this happens, we want to respond swiftly and, where we can, try to put things right. If you or a family member has a concern, please raise it directly with a member of your care team. If necessary, they will escalate the feedback to a senior colleague on duty and/or our Patient Experience Manager for further intervention or support. You can choose to raise your concern anonymously, without giving anyone your name, but that may make it more difficult for us to investigate thoroughly and give you feedback on the outcome.
We also value complaints for the feedback they provide, so when patients and visitors offer criticism or praise, we listen carefully. All comments and complaints are treated confidentially and investigated thoroughly and openly. This allows us to explain what happened, apologise where appropriate and take action to improve. If you would like to get in touch, please email [email protected].
To make a formal complaint, please follow this guidance.
Getting Back to You
Acknowledgements of complaints will be sent within three working days of receiving the complaint. We will then reply in full as promptly as we can — usually within 20 working days.
If the investigation is still ongoing after 20 days, we will write to explain the delay. In very complex cases, which may take more time, we will send you regular progress reports. We may suggest meeting with you to talk through your issues and attempt to resolve them.
How we use your information
Cleveland Clinic London is committed to using your health and care to provide the best possible care, monitor our services and improve your experience.
We are also committed to exceeding the requirements of the Data Protection Legislation by adhering to multiple standards that keep information safe, accurate and used appropriately. This includes ensuring that our patients have a clear understanding of how their information is used.
To find out more, please see our Privacy Policy.
