Document

Author
Sharon Beza, Lauren Morgan, Andrea Granger, Joe McCloud 4 & Peter Jeffries
Abstract
In acute hospital care, sampling a patient’s blood is frequently used to help guide diagnosis, or to understand a patient’s response to treatment. This means many patients will have their blood taken multiple times during an inpatient stay. The work of phlebotomists has been studied before, and acknowledgements made to how they adjust their practice to balance patient safety in the context of fluctuating demands and challenging work environments and equipment (Pickup et al., 2017). A human factors approach was used to analyse the in-patient phlebotomy service within a local National Health Service (NHS) Trust. Multiple systems related issues particularly at organisational level were identified. Recommendations were made on how to improve the safety and reliability of the process.