How to tell us about a patient safety concern

We would like to hear from everyone who uses or works in the healthcare system, including patients, families, carers and healthcare staff. This helps us to understand how patient safety issues affect different groups.

HSSIB cannot provide support in an emergency or get involved in ongoing care. If you believe there is an immediate risk to life, or your concerns require urgent support, please contact 999 or NHS 111.

People may contact us because they need advice on where to get support after an incident or concerning experience in healthcare. There are lists of other organisations who may be able to help you on the support for patients and families and support for NHS and healthcare staff  pages.

How we use your information

We look at issues that have caused harm or have the potential to cause harm to patients. We collect this information to build a picture of patient safety issues over time. This allows us to identify patient safety concerns that HSSIB could potentially investigate, to have a positive impact on healthcare.

We cannot use this information to investigate individual concerns, or concerns that relate to specific healthcare providers or staff. We also cannot resolve complaints, or act on behalf of patients or families. This may seem confusing, but it’s because we do not have the remit to resolve or investigate concerns in this way. Find out more about who we are and  what we investigate.

Whilst we cannot use the information shared with us to investigate individual concerns, hearing about experiences and risks in healthcare helps us to ensure that the patient safety issues we do investigate will provide learning and improvements to benefit as many people as possible.

Complete our online form

If you are unable to complete the online form, you can email us at insights@hssib.org.uk to request a phone call. Please include your contact number and the best time to call you when you request a phone call. A member of our team will call you to complete the form with you. We aim to call within five working days.

Everything you share with us is in the strictest confidence and in line with our privacy notice. We’ll only share information if we believe there’s an urgent risk to individuals and will always try to contact you to discuss this first.

What happens next

If you complete our online form, you’ll receive an email with a reference number confirming we have received your information.

If you request a call back to complete the form with you, we aim to do this within five working days.

When you have completed the form, we will only be in touch again if we need further information relating to your concerns.