Episode 11: Suzette Woodward on safety in healthcare.

Suzette Woodward has had a distinguished career in healthcare – in the clinical world as a PICU nurse, and then in a number of positions in patient safety, including a director role at the National Patient Safety Agency and as lead for the Sign up to Safety initiative.  In this conversation, Suzette reflects on her career in safety, and discusses opportunities for the future.  We cover a lot of topics, including: how to define safety; what constitutes good leadership; what we mean by culture; how safety-II 'fits' in the wider safety landscape; Vincent and Amalberti's 3-part model of safe systems (ultra-safe / high reliability / ultra-adaptive) and much more.  There are many highlights in this conversation, and there is a clear golden thread of compassion throughout Suzette’s career – she articulates a very clear desire to help others as the main motivation for her work.  Suzette reminds us that the reason we do this work is to help others, and that the envelope of concern includes the staff / colleagues as well as the patients.