Hospitals - Kill or cure, another view on treatment in the UK

Putting targets and cost-cutting above patient safety is proving to be a major issue facing the NHS in the UK.

Following answers to Liberal Democrats questions a number of figures were uncovered.

Eleven people are seriously harmed during NHS surgery every day, it emerged yesterday.

The number of major errors has risen by 28 per cent in five years, with more than 4,000 patients hurt in 2007/08.

Mistakes include such objects as scalpels and coils being left inside patients, organs  punctured, and the wrong dosage of drugs being administered.

A total of 722 objects were left inside patients during surgery last year – one every two and a half days.That number has soared by 13 per cent in the five years to 2007/08.

The Commons health select committee warned that a further hospital disaster like the one at Stafford, where over 400 people died, could not be ruled out – as managers were putting targets and cost-cutting above patient safety.

Government policy 'too often' gave the impression that hitting waiting list targets, achieving financial balance and achieving elite foundation trust status were more important than patient safety.

MP's added that many mistakes were not reported by the NHS.

The figures illustrate that there have been a 17,921 errors during surgery over the past five years.

The number of cases every year has gone up by 28 per cent to 4,161 in 2007/08 – 11 a day.

Many of the cases involve people having organs mistakenly punctured, which can lead to haemorrhaging.

Over the last five years, the organs of 12,125 patients were punctured, with the annual figures soaring 33 per cent to 2,817 in 2007/08.

Hundreds of other surgical mistakes have been reported, including not removing or inserting tubes properly, using wrongly-matched blood, forgetting to give drugs on time, and not sterilising equipment correctly.

Failure to sterilise is a major method by which superbugs like C. Diff and MRSA can spread.

The total uncovered by the Liberal Democrats represent only a fraction of the mistakes made in the NHS every year, as it only covers errors during operations.

Overall, there are around 250,000 mistakes causing harm to patients reported across the Health Service every year. Frighteningly more than 3,600 of those affected die as a result of NHS Mistakes