Examining the issue of corridor care, NHS patient safety and the law

The NHS model of care that we have, the provision of free healthcare services based on clinical need, poses well-known challenges. Nursing and medicine do not stand still, new treatments regularly come on stream, new diseases also come along, and these must be properly managed. We can add to the mix a growing elderly population often presenting with several chronic conditions. All this needs to be factored into everyday healthcare practice. We have all seen media stories about long waiting lists, delays in getting appointments and now ‘corridor care’. The NHS needs to be able to cope and balance matters – all much easier said than done.

The NHS model of care that we all benefit from can never be fundamentally changed as this would not be politically acceptable; no government would risk the wrath of an electorate by fundamentally altering the foundation of the NHS too much. The NHS Constitution for England and its principles, rights and pledges (Department of Health and Social Care, 2023) sets a good baseline on which to set our expectations of the NHS. One particularly related to patient safety is on quality of care and environment: