Incident Reporting

Course Aim

To help frontline care workers recognise incidents, respond appropriately, document facts accurately and escalate concerns promptly. The course promotes learning from incidents and near misses to improve practice and reduce preventable harm.

Who Is This Course For?

Care assistants, healthcare assistants, support workers, senior carers and similar frontline staff working in care homes, domiciliary care, supported living and healthcare settings.

Course Scope

Designed primarily for services in England, this course focuses on frontline responsibilities: protecting people, taking immediate action within your competence, recording information and following local reporting procedures.

It introduces statutory reporting responsibilities without replacing training for designated reporting roles. Not every care incident is reportable under RIDDOR 2013; statutory reports must be handled by the appropriate responsible person.

What the Course Covers

1. Recognising incidents: accidents, incidents and near misses.
2. Immediate response: protecting people, seeking help and making the situation safe.
3. Accurate documentation: essential information, factual language and common reporting errors.
4. Reporting and escalation: local procedures, urgent concerns and safeguarding.
5. Common care incidents: medication errors, falls, equipment failures and environmental hazards.
6. Confidentiality: appropriate information handling and sharing.
7. RIDDOR awareness: its purpose and the limits of individual reporting responsibilities.
8. Learning and improvement: identifying concerns and helping prevent recurrence.

Learning Objectives and Outcomes

By the end of the course, learners should be able to:

1. Explain why incident reporting matters and distinguish incidents, accidents and near misses.
2. Identify common care incidents and describe appropriate immediate actions.
3. Record information clearly, factually and accurately while protecting confidentiality.
4. Identify appropriate reporting routes and recognise when urgent or safeguarding escalation is required.
5. Explain the basic purpose of RIDDOR 2013 and recognise the boundaries of their statutory reporting responsibilities.
6. Describe how incident reporting supports safer practice and continuous improvement.

CPD Relevance

This course supports continuing professional development in safe care, record keeping, communication, professional accountability and learning from incidents.

Key References and Further Reading

Legislation and regulations

1. Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974.
2. Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations 2013.
3. Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014, particularly Regulation 12: Safe care and treatment and Regulation 17: Good governance.

Guidance and workplace procedures

1. CQC guidance on Regulations 12 and 17.
2. HSE guidance on RIDDOR in health and social care and reportable incidents.
3. Relevant organisational incident reporting, safeguarding, medication, falls, confidentiality and health and safety procedures.