Billy Kelleher (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail)
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677. To ask the Minister for Health the percentage of serious reportable events currently being notified within 24 hours to a designated officer. [33953/17]

Billy Kelleher (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail)
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678. To ask the Minister for Health the percentage of mandatory investigations commenced within 48 hours of the events occurring. [33954/17]

Billy Kelleher (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail)
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679. To ask the Minister for Health the percentage of mandatory investigations currently completed within four months of notification of the events occurring. [33955/17]

Billy Kelleher (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail)
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680. To ask the Minister for Health the percentage of reportable events in 2017 that have been reported within 30 days of occurrence to the designated officer. [33956/17]

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 677 to 680, inclusive, together.

As these are service matters the questions have been referred to the HSE for attention and direct reply to the Deputy.

The Department of Health takes the management of patient safety very seriously and the establishment of the National Patient Safety Office (NPSO) is just one of a number of patient safety reforms agreed by Government in November 2015. The Office, launched in December 2016, is overseeing a programme of patient safety measures including progressing a programme of legislation. This legislative programme will include provision for the open disclosure of patient safety incidents, through the Department of Justice and Equality's Civil Liability Amendment Bill 2017; the Health Information and Patient Safety Bill, which will provide for the mandatory reporting of serious incidents, and a Patient Safety Licensing Bill, which will introduce a regulatory regime for all hospitals as well as certain designated high risk activities.

In particular, the General Scheme of the Health Information and Patient Safety Bill approved by Government in November 2015 provides for the extension of the Health Information and Quality Authority's (HIQA’s) remit to the private sector, mandatory external reporting of Serious Reportable Events and measures to promote clinical audit. The measures to support clinical audit and patient safety incident notifications in the Bill will help promote a culture of patient safety and build a health service which can identify, respond to and learn from error and monitor and commit to ongoing quality improvement through identifying opportunities for improvement. The Bill has undergone pre-legislative scrutiny (PLS) with the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Health. The PLS Report was forwarded to the Minister on 15 May and is currently being considered by the Department.

In addition, HIQA and the Mental Health Commission have recently finalised new 'Standards on the Conduct of Reviews of Patient Safety Incidents' which expand on the National Standards for Safer Better Healthcare. This set of standards along with the mandatory reporting of serious reportable events provided for in the Health Information and Patient Safety Bill and provisions intended for open disclosure will provide a comprehensive patient-centred approach to preventing, managing and learning from incidents. Finally, the Health Service Executive's (HSE's) Incident Management Framework is currently being revised and will guide staff in system analysis methodology and levels of investigation required to facilitate the learning from adverse events and the prevention of reoccurrence.