The Development of a Tool to Identify Variations in Risk Perception between Hospital Clinicians and Hospital Managers

Mechanisms designed to implement good clinical governance in the British National Health Service (NHS) have highlighted a need to integrate systems for clinical and non-clinical risk management. Making such integration a reality will require the marriage of two different cultures—the ‘clinical’ and the ‘management’. As in any such union, expectations and perceptions may have a significant part to play. This paper briefly reviews a study which examined the perceptions of two of the key stakeholders in the NHS—nurses and managers—and considers some possible implications. Findings reveal differences in the levels of perceived risk between the two groups. These differences give rise to concerns that those who have greater knowledge of practical risk may have different perceptions of risk levels than those who are charged with policy-making. It is proposed that a tool be developed to help bridge the gap between policy and practice (between, respectively, manager and nurse) and to provide objective evidence of where to focus a hospital's risk management and education policies.