The Impact of the Employment of Temporary Staff on the Management of Risk in a Hospital: Implications for Patient Safety and Service Quality

Zofia Bajorek : PhD student

David Guest and Michael Clinton: Supervisors

Aims:

• To map the use of temporary staff and the type of temporary staff across a London NHS foundation trust and how the pattern of use is changing.
• To analyse the existing procedures for ensuring that temporary staff are able to manage risk to patient safety and service quality.
• To identify the perceptions of different stakeholder groups within general clinical management about the advantages and disadvantages of employing temporary staff with respect to risk.
• To obtain perceptions and experiences of temporary and permanent staff with respect to the implications of temporary staff employment for management of risk and with respect to the protocols in place to ensure that temporary staff minimise risk to patient safety and service quality.
• To identify methods by which the management of risk could be improved, where temporary staff are involved.

Why is this important?

There has been an increasing focus on the importance of effective management of patient safety and service quality, with a focus on minimising risks to patients. Research highlights the importance of continuity or care, but has generally failed to take into account the implications of using a significant amount of temporary and short-term contract staff. There is also a growing body of research on the employment of temporary workers addressing the attitudes and experiences of temporary workers, and while some of this has looked at healthcare settings, there has been little focus on the relationship between temporary workers and risk to patients.

Participants:

This is an ESRC Case awarded PhD linked to the wider research programme of King's PSSQ. The research will include semi-structured interviews with managers, permanent and temporary staff, as well as observation of staff at work during critical periods. Staff members and wards for interviews and observations will be chosen after an analysis of temporary employment records have been reviewed indicating where high and low use of temporary staff occurs.

Anticipated Outcomes:

• Add to the limited research that currently exists on how temporary employment and risk management.
• To identify methods by which the management of risk could be improved, where temporary staff are involved, and to apply them in the trust.
• The project will also produce papers for conferences, and literature to be published in academic journals.