About this course
Human factors in healthcare sit at the heart of patient safety. Most serious incidents are not due to a lack of medical knowledge, but to breakdowns in communication, teamwork, decision making and system design. As services become busier and more complex, clinicians need practical Human Factors skills just as much as clinical ones if they are to keep patients safe and support their teams under pressure.
This Human Factors in Healthcare course turns theory into everyday practice. Using real NHS scenarios, near misses and critical incidents, the course explores why capable clinicians still make mistakes, how systems shape behaviour, and what you can do on the shop floor to prevent harm. You will learn a shared language for human error, risk and reliability that you can use with colleagues across disciplines.
Across the course, key Human Factors concepts are linked to the realities of clinical work: handovers on an overcrowded ward, decision making in theatre, situational awareness in clinic, and managing fatigue on call. You will practise simple tools you can take straight back to work, from briefing and debriefing checklists to graded assertiveness and cognitive aids.
By the end you will understand how to spot the early warning signs of trouble, design safer processes, and influence culture within your team. You will leave with practical strategies to improve patient safety, support colleagues, and demonstrate leadership in quality improvement and governance.
Teaching is interactive and case-based, using short presentations, clinical scenarios, group discussions and guided reflection. The course is designed to be highly relevant to busy clinicians and to encourage application of Human Factors ideas to your own workplace.
- Understand Human Factors in healthcare and their impact on safety
- Recognise key error types and how systems and workload drive risk
- Apply Human Factors principles to handover, theatre, clinic and ward rounds
- Communicate clearly in high stakes situations using speaking up tools
- Strengthen situational awareness, decision making and teamwork
- Use Human Factors thinking in incident reviews and safety improvement
