Civil Liability (Amendment) Act 2017

• Permanent Page URL

Provision of additional information at additional information meeting

18. (1) A health services provider may, at any time after the holding of the open disclosure meeting, provide information that is additional to the information, specified in section 16 (3), which was, in accordance with section 16 (2)(a), provided to the patient or relevant person (or both of them) at the open disclosure meeting (“additional information”) that, having regard to—

(a)subparagraphs (i) and (ii) of paragraph (a) of section 14 (1), and

(b) section 14 (4),

was not available to the health services provider at the time of the making of the open disclosure of the patient safety incident and which, after that open disclosure of that incident was made, has become available and may, having regard to that additional information, make an apology, and such additional information and apology (if any) shall be provided, or made—

(i) by the principal health practitioner who made the open disclosure of the patient safety incident in accordance with section 13 ,

(ii) where, pursuant to section 13 (1)(b), the open disclosure of the patient safety incident was made by a health practitioner referred to in section 13 (2), by that health practitioner, or

(iii) by a health practitioner referred to in subsection (2).

(2) Where additional information referred to in subsection (1) is, in accordance with that subsection, to be provided (and an apology, if any, to be made) to a patient or relevant person (or both of them) and the person who, in accordance with section 13 , made the open disclosure of the patient safety incident—

(a) is not available to provide that additional information (or make an apology), or

(b) is otherwise not in a position to provide that information (or make an apology),

that additional information (and apology, if any) shall be provided, or made, by a health practitioner whom the health services provider considers appropriate.

(3) A health services provider shall make arrangements—

(a) to meet with a patient or a relevant person (or both of them), or

(b) where it is not practicable for a patient or a relevant person (or both of them) to attend at a meeting with the provider, for that patient or person (or both of them) to be contacted by telephone (or other similar method of communication),

for the purpose of providing that additional information (in this Part referred to as an “additional information meeting”).

(4) When providing the additional information referred to in subsection (1) at an additional information meeting, a health services provider—

(a) shall provide the additional information in accordance with subsection (5),

(b) may provide the additional information—

(i) orally, and

(ii) in the order in which the health services provider considers appropriate, having regard to all the circumstances of the patient or the relevant person (or both of them) and the patient safety incident concerned,

and

(c) shall give the patient or the relevant person (or both of them) a copy of the statement in writing referred to in subsection (6) or, in the case of an additional information meeting referred to in subsection (3)(b), shall deliver a copy of that statement to the patient or relevant person (or both of them) as soon as practicable after the meeting.

(5) When providing the additional information referred to in subsection (1)—

(a) the health services provider shall provide the names of the persons present at the additional information meeting,

(b) the health services provider shall have regard to the provisions of section 16 (3) and shall specify the provisions of that section to which the additional information, provided at the additional information meeting, refers,

(c) without prejudice to paragraph (b), where having regard to the additional information provided, the health services provider has reasonable grounds for believing that further physical or psychological consequences referred to in section 16 (3)(f), are likely to present or develop, the health services provider shall provide further information in respect of—

(i) any physical or psychological consequences which, at the time the additional information meeting is held, have not presented, or developed, but which, notwithstanding such absence, the health services provider reasonably believes are likely to present or develop at any time after that meeting, and

(ii) any physical or psychological consequences which, at the time of the additional information meeting, have not presented, or developed, and which the health services provider reasonably believes are less likely or unlikely to present or develop at any time after the holding of that meeting,

(d) without prejudice to paragraph (b) and having regard to the additional information, where, at the time the additional information meeting is held—

(i) any physical or psychological consequences arising from the patient safety incident have presented, or developed,

(ii) the patient is under the clinical care of the health services provider concerned,

(iii) having regard to the information referred to in section 16 (3)(h) which was provided at the open disclosure meeting, and

(iv) the health services provider proposes to make changes to the treatment, and relevant clinical care, the provider is providing to the patient to address those consequences,

the health services provider shall provide information relating to those changes to the treatment and clinical care.

(6) The statement referred to in subsection (4)(c), that is to be given to the patient or the relevant person (or both of them) by the health services provider in accordance with that subsection, shall—

(a) be in the prescribed form,

(b) set out the additional information, specified in subsection (5), provided to the patient or the relevant person (or both of them) in accordance with that subsection,

(c) contain an apology referred to in subsection (1) where such apology was made,

(d) specify the day on which the additional information was provided to the patient or the relevant person (or both of them), and

(e) be signed in accordance with subsection (7).

(7) The statement in writing referred to in subsection (6) shall be signed by—

(a) the principal health practitioner referred to in subsection (1)(i), or

(b) the health practitioner referred to in subsection (1)(ii) or (1)(iii),

who provided the additional information to the patient or relevant person (or both of them) in accordance with this section.

(8) The health services provider shall keep, in the records referred to in section 21 , the statement referred to in subsection (6).

(9) Nothing in this section shall operate to prevent the additional information being provided (and an apology, if any, being made), at the additional information meeting, to—

(a) both the patient and the relevant person where the open disclosure of the patient safety incident (and an apology, if any) was made to either of them at the open disclosure meeting, and

(b) a relevant person where—

(i) the open disclosure of the patient safety incident (and an apology, if any) was made to the patient concerned at the open disclosure meeting, and

(ii) the patient died subsequent to the time at which the open disclosure meeting was held.

(10) Section 10 shall apply to—

(a) any information provided (or apology made) to the patient or the relevant person (or both of them) at the additional information meeting, in the same way as section 10 applies to information provided, and an apology where it is made, at an open disclosure meeting, and

(b) the statement referred to in subsection (6) in the same way as it applies to the statement referred to in section 16 (5).