Dear Birmingham Women's and Children's NHS Foundation Trust,

I am writing to request information regarding your use of Physician Associates.

1) How many Physician Associates are currently employed by your organisation?

2) Please provide copies of any policies regarding physician associates in your organisation. For example, policies regarding the scope of practice, clinical procedures, governance, supervision and appraisal processes for physician associates.

3) Please provide details of any patient safety incidents (reported via Datix or other internal patient safety reporting systems) where the clinician involved was a Physician Associate. Where possible, please include a breakdown of these incidents by year, severity and categorisation (e.g., department, nature of the incident, patient harm, outcome, organisational response etc).

Yours faithfully,

Michael Bridger

Dear Birmingham Women's and Children's NHS Foundation Trust,

Please pass this on to the person who conducts Freedom of Information reviews.

I am writing to request an internal review of Birmingham Women's and Children's NHS Foundation Trust's handling of my FOI request 'Details regarding the use of Physician Associates'.

I appreciate your response to my request for information regarding patient safety incidents involving Physician Associates. I understand the constraints related to data protection and the risk of identifying individuals when fewer than 5 incidents are reported.

However, could you provide more generalised information to fulfil the request within these constraints? For instance, a summary of the types of incidents (without specific details) and the measures taken by the organisation to address these would be invaluable. This approach would maintain confidentiality while offering insights into the overall safety culture and the role of Physician Associates in patient care.

I believe this adjusted request aligns with both the spirit of the Freedom of Information Act and the need to protect individual privacy. Thank you for reconsidering my request under these guidelines.

Yours faithfully,

Michael Bridger

Dear FREEDOMOFINFORMATION (BIRMINGHAM WOMEN'S AND CHILDREN'S NHS FOUNDATION TRUST),

I want to highlight that I never received a response to this internal review request.

Yours sincerely,

Michael Bridger