Patient Safety Partner

South Western Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust; Exeter; Hybrid; GBP 150,000 - 200,000; Part time

Job summary

A regional emergency services provider is seeking voluntary Patient Safety Partners to enhance patient care and safety. This honorary role requires approximately 2 days a month commitment, providing an involvement payment while offering insights based on personal experiences as patients or carers. Ideal candidates should have relevant experience, good communication skills, and an understanding of patient safety issues.

Responsibilities

• Chair the Patient Participation Panel with patients and public.
• Serve on the Quality Assurance & Learning Committee.
• Engage in discussions about safety with patients and staff.
• Contribute to improvement project designs.
• Help develop patient safety information resources.
• Assist in understanding and enhancing positive practices.

Skills

Recent and relevant experience as a patient or carer

Understanding of patient safety

Ability to communicate well in writing

Confidence and ability to chair meetings

Ability to represent community views

Experience in championing health improvements

Job description

Patient Safety Partner

The closing date is 12 December 2025

Would you like to help the future of Patient Safety within South Western Ambulance Service? Do you have a keen interest in making care safer for patients and have a 'lived' patient or carer experience of the ambulance or other NHS services?

We are recruiting two voluntary Patient Safety Partners (PSPs), a lay role developed by NHS England to help improve patient safety, for a tenure of initially 18 months. Our PSPs work alongside our teams to ensure that decisions, processes and risks are considered from a patient perspective.

This is a lay role working on an honorary contract (i.e. non-employment) basis within a multi‑disciplinary team of professionals dedicated to the provision of outstanding patient‑centred care. Successful applicants will be expected to commit to approximately 2 days per month to the role for the period of the tenure, for which we will pay an involvement payment of £75 per half‑day / £150 per full‑day (equivalent to £20 per hour) for attending committee and other patient safety‑related meetings. Expenses, such as travel, will also be paid.

As this is a lay role, it is not open to current Trust employees.

Main duties of the job

A Patient Safety Partner is actively involved in the design of safer healthcare at all levels in the organisation. The PSP will work collaboratively within the Patient Safety and Clinical Governance teams to represent the voice of the patient, attend relevant committees, and support key improvement projects delivered by the Patient Safety Team. Using their 'lived experience' as a patient or a member of their local community, the PSP will support and advise the Trust on activities, policies and procedures that will help improve patient safety and promote high‑quality care. Through their objective contribution, lived experiences, and patient/carer insights, the PSP will help support effective safety governance and risk management.

Our PSPs are active members of the Trust's Quality Assurance & Learning Committee, whose primary objective is to ensure that patient care and services are safe and effective, that safety learnings are identified, and that risks to quality are managed and escalated appropriately.

Our PSPs will jointly chair, with other PSP(s), the Trust's quarterly Patient Participation Panel which is attended by patients, their families and members of the public to provide feedback with the aim of improving the care and service provided to our patients.

Our PSPs should ensure that any committee or group of which they are a member considers and prioritises the service user, patient, carer and family perspective and champions a diversity of views.

About us

Working for us is an experience like no other. We provide emergency and urgent care, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, operating across the largest ambulance region in England of 10,000 square miles and responding to an average of 2,650 incidents every day.

We remain committed to ensuring that we provide the best possible care for all our patients, which is reflected in our new five‑year strategy which has continually improving patient care at its very core.

At the heart of our beautiful and diverse region we employ over 6,000 people and are supported by over 575 volunteers.

Job responsibilities

The role of Patient Safety Partner represents a great opportunity to share your interest, experiences and skills to help further develop the PSP role, and be part of the team here at SWASFT. Some examples of what you will be involved in include:

• Being one of the joint chairs of the Patient Participation Panel which is attended by patients and members of the public to provide feedback.
• Being a member of the Trust's Quality Assurance & Learning Committee, whose primary objective is to ensure that patient care and services are safe and effective, and that risks to quality are managed and escalated appropriately.
• Talking with patients and staff about safety and what matters to them.
• Being part of project teams contributing to the design of improvement plans focused upon improving safe care and associated systems and processes.
• Helping develop patient safety information resources.
• Helping us understand what we do well and how we can do more of this.

Person Specification

Skills and experience

• Recent and relevant experience of being a patient, carer of someone using health services.
• Understanding of patient safety.
• Ability to communicate well in writing.
• Confidence and ability to chair meetings.
• Ability to put forward views on behalf of wider community, not own opinion only.
• Experience of championing health improvements.

Disclosure and Barring Service Check

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.

Address

Trust HQ, Exeter but predominantly working from home.

Contract

Honorary

Working pattern

Part‑time

Reference number

202-7607619

Job locations

Trust HQ, Exeter but predominantly working from home.

Pay

£20 per hour involvement payment. Volunteer lay role.