The Patient Safety (Notifiable Incidents and Open Disclosure) Act 2019 is awaiting a Commencement Order.

The Patient Safety (Notifiable Incidents and Open Disclosure) Act 2019 is awaiting a Commencement Order. Grace Toher gives an overview of what to expect from the Act.

Mandatory Open Disclosure – Update

In May, the Patient Safety (Notifiable Incidents and Open Disclosure) Bill 2019 was signed into law by the President. Once the Commencement Order is signed by the Minister, the Patient Safety (Notifiable Incidents and Open Disclosure) Act 2023 (the “Act”) will come into force. Grace Toher gives an overview of what to expect from the Act.

In brief, under this piece of legislation, health practitioners and service providers, in both public and private settings, have an obligation to be transparent with patients and their families when a notifiable patient safety incident has occurred. The Act sets out clearly what qualifies as a notifiable incident, procedures for how this disclosure should be made and what information should be disclosed. A further function of this legislation is to enable learning from patient safety incidents by obliging a health service provider to report notifiable incidents to the relevant regulatory body, with an aim to prevent harm to other patients.

“Part 5 Review”

The Act also sets out the process for disclosing audit reviews in cancer screening services.   Part 5 of the  Act  allows a patient to request a review of the results of a screening which has been carried out by CervicalCheck, BreastCheck and Bowel Screen  in relation to the patient (“Part 5 Review”).

Every patient undergoing screening will be informed of their right to make a request for a Part 5 review either before or at the time the cancer screening is carried out.  Where a Part 5 Review has been requested by the patient, the health service provider will hold an open disclosure meeting.  Similar to disclosures of notifiable patient safety incidents, information provided and an apology where it is made during open disclosure of a Part 5 Review will not invalidate insurance, constitute an admission of liability or fault or be admissible in subsequent proceedings.

For more information on Open Disclosure, please contact our Healthcare Litigation Team.

To learn more about the Bill, please see Yvonne Joyce’s previous article which gave a detailed overview.

Read the full Act here: