Hospitals are being told to end the practice of discharging vulnerable people from wards during the night.
The Government is meeting with 22 nursing leaders today to launch the Nursing and Care Quality Forum. Public Health Minister, Anne Milton, says they're investing a million pounds to raise standards across the UK and ensure patients are treated with "dignity, compassion and respect".
David Cameron's panel is made up of frontline nurses, patient representatives and medical experts. They will:
David Cameron will also call for patients to be treated with more dignity and respect. The Prime Minister is meeting nurses in Downing Street to 'restore a sense of pride' to the profession.
Mr Cameron is to host the first meeting of the Nursing and Care Quality Forum, announced in January to address concerns about the way some patients are treated.
The Medical Director of the NHS, Professor Sir Bruce Keogh, has written to Strategic Health Authorities urging them to urgently review practices. Last week it emerged hundreds of thousands of patients are sent home in the middle of the night.
– Professor Sir Bruce Keogh, Medical Director of the NHSWhile some patients may of course choose to be discharged during these hours, the examples highlighted of elderly patients being left to make their way home by themselves in the middle of the night are obviously unacceptable, and need to be addressed urgently... As health professionals we all agree that patients should be treated with compassion, so it is simply not acceptable to send people home from hospital late at night when they may have no family members nearby to support them.