Medical examiner update
A new medical examiner system is being rolled out across England and Wales to provide greater scrutiny of deaths, while also offering a point of contact for bereaved families to raise concerns about the care provided prior to the death of a loved one.
Acute trusts in England and local health boards in Wales have been asked to set up medical examiner offices: a team of seven regional medical examiners for England and a lead medical examiner for Wales are to be appointed this month, with regional medical examiner officers in England and a lead medical examiner officer for Wales to follow.
NHS Wales Shared Service Partnership appointed Andrew Evans a Programme Director for the Medical Examiner Service. He took his post on 10 July.
The current focus is on developing medical examiner services within acute trusts and extending this out to all deaths across secondary care. However, it is planned that the medical examiner service will cover all deaths, wherever they occur, by March 2021.
The NHS is also developing a digital system to support medical examiner offices with the administrative elements of their work that can be used for the creation and storage of records to contribute to the death certification process. The NHS is ready to pilot the system and will be inviting a number of NHS trusts and Welsh health boards to test it in their medical examiner office.
Find out more here.
Tags: acute trusts, England and Wales, legislation, medical examiner, NHS, pilot, regulation