Dr Del Wijeratne

Clinical Leadership Fellow 2015-2016

Dr Del Wijeratne - Clinical Leadership Fellow 2015-16

Contact Details

Email: Academy@yhia.nhs.uk

Human Factors: Del worked on a training package based upon the emerging evidence around effective surgical checklist implementation. He also helped to set up a Community of Practice for teams undertaking Human Factors training across Yorkshire.

Complex-Adaptive-Systems in Healthcare: Del worked on using a new narrative capture tool as a patient safety thermometer. He also worked on a team-based reflection process which aims to look at near-miss events within a complexity framework.

Del shared some reflections after his year working with the Improvement Academy as a Clinical Leadership Fellow:

During my time as a leadership fellow, I worked on a number of projects including how behaviour change methods can be used to improve surgical safety, how novel story telling techniques can be used to monitor safety in maternity units and how video techniques can be used to improve handover processes. The common theme that runs through all of these relates to how we can improve our safety processes to keep pace with the increasing complexity of modern healthcare. The Improvement Academy provides a highly unique atmosphere to undertake such work.

Alongside the project work, the close links with bodies such as the Yorkshire Quality & Safety Research Group and the regular input and training from a variety of external experts has also allowed me to develop a good grasp of the fundamental principles of safety research and improvement science. Finally, there has also been ample opportunity to experience how Quality, Safety and Improvement are approached throughout the various levels of NHS management. Overall, I feel I have been given a huge head-start for life as a more senior clinician in an NHS where issues of quality & safety have become inseparable from everyday clinical work.

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