PP0642 - Safe and Effective Practice in Integrated Health & Social Care

You will be engaged in active learning to facilitate skills development in root cause and critical analysis which will be achieved through a combination of activities and environments including lectures, tutorials, simulated events and independent study. Lectures, tutorials and online discussion activities will enable you to gain formative feedback from both academic staff and peers.

Seminars will provide you with an opportunity to discuss and develop your thinking in a small group. A range of electronic and interactive resources will be available via the Electronic Learning Portal (eLP), including tutor’s video explanations and summaries which will complement lectures material, discussion boards and appropriate use of social media tools such as Twitter. Your development of knowledge and understanding in this module will be shaped by your ability to relate theories, concepts and frameworks to practical situations faced by professionals. As such, you will use theory to examine situations, and to diagnose particular challenges and opportunities which research and guidance suggests professionals face.

Tutors will support your learning through a variety of ways on this module. They will provide a programme of lectures which relate to the learning outcomes for the module; these lectures will make connections between theory and practice, as we expect you to do. Additionally, you will have the opportunity to work in a smaller seminar group where you will discuss lecture content and your insights gained from directed tasks. Contact details for all tutors for this module are available in the module handbook and via the eLP.

All modules at Northumbria include a range of reading materials that students are expected to engage with. Online reading lists (provided after enrolment) give you access to your reading material for your modules. The Library works in partnership with your module tutors to ensure you have access to the material that you need.

Knowledge & Understanding:
1. Demonstrate a critical understanding of Human Factors that impact health and social care; reviewing contemporary literature and the underpinning theories and research.

2. You will recognise the multifaceted nature of ‘risk’ and the difference between risk avoidance and risk selection and the potential for conflict between parties concerned with managing risk in health and social care.

Intellectual / Professional skills & abilities:
3. Critically explore, assess and discuss the human factors implications of exemplar events / incidents and reflect on their implications to health & social care.

Personal Values Attributes (Global / Cultural awareness, Ethics, Curiosity) (PVA):

4. You will evaluate the importance of self-awareness, reflection and your own responsibility to recognise errors and opportunities for critical incident to occur.

5. Critically discuss the relationship between human factors, individual and team performance and patient safety.

Summative assessment for this module is a single, 4,000 word assignment. You may select your assignment title from a small number (approx. 3) of options to be presented at the start of the module in the handbook.

Assessment of all options will be subject to the following assessment criteria:

a. You demonstrate effective understanding of all the module learning outcomes..
b. You effectively engage with and apply relevant academic literature (e.g. theoretical material and case reviews, legislation, guidance) and other sector -relevant (e.g. evaluation studies, professional publications) material.

Additional formative assessment - detail of process and rationale:

You will be required to develop a detailed plan for the summative assignment addressing both structure and content of your planned work, demonstrating ways in which you will meet the published assessment criteria. Tutors will specify the format of the plan which will require a series of narrative summaries of proposed material divided by sections and will also require details of references to academic literature. You will receive a group tutorial to support you in the development of this plan and will submit this plan in sufficient time to receive detailed written formative feedback from module tutors.

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Human Factors (HF) or as it is often referred to ‘ergonomics’ is a specific science which dominates safety in High Reliability/Safety Critical Industries and Organisations such as the military, aviation and nuclear fuel. The principles are recognised as essential to the improvement of safety across health and, more recently, services aliened to health. It is about “enhancing clinical performance through an understanding of the effects of teamwork, tasks, equipment, workspace, culture and organisation on human behaviour” (Catchpole 2010). A number of high profile enquiries into avoidable deaths and abuse within health and social care across organisations in the UK have contributed to an unprecedented imperative for services to improve safety. You will examine the principles of Human Factors to reflect upon the characteristic of High Reliability Organising and apply them to critical issues in health and social care services.