§ Mr. BurstowTo ask the Secretary of State for Health what plans his Department has to introduce a black box style system to retain key biometric data for major operations; and if he will make a statement. [162639]
§ Ms Rosie WintertonThe operating theatre black box system has been invented by a scientist in Britain and can be used to record the actions of surgical teams and clinical information about a patient during an operation. It is one method to support learning and improve patient safety.
The Government recognise the need to understand more about the nature and causes of errors in surgery and as part of the Department's patient safety research programme has funded research into the safety of surgical care. The research team will make recommendations to inform surgical team training in error management in the future. The national Patient Safety Agency is also undertaking work to reduce patient safety incidents associated with surgery.
Further information is available on the patient safety research programme w3bsite at: http://www.publichealth,bham.ac.uk/psrp and on the National Patient Safety Agency website at: http://www.npsa.nhs.uk.