LONDON: The NHS could afford to employ tens of thousands of extra nurses if it stamped out basic errors which put patient safety at risk, Jeremy Hunt will say on Thursday.

The Health Secretary will tell staff that a culture change is needed to stop cash-strapped hospitals wasting as much as £2.5 billion (Dh14.7 billion) a year on needless mistakes.

Experts estimate that around 755,000 patients — one in 20 — are harmed every year in hospital. Common avoidable mistakes include bed ulcers, falls, blood clots, drug errors and infections.

In a speech at Birmingham Children’s Hospital on Thursday, Mr Hunt will tell NHS staff that poor care is the `most wasteful and expensive’ failing made by hospitals — meaning patients suffer complications and longer stays as a result.

Research by independent economists released last night reveals that the average patient who develops a bed sore spends 12 more days in hospital, adding an average of £2,500 to their NHS costs.

The report estimates that errors in patient safety cost the NHS between £1 billion and £2.5 billion a year, including the expense of extra treatment, bed space and nursing, as well as huge compensation payouts.

This would cover the salaries of at least 60,000 extra nurses.

Mr Hunt will say: “I want every director of every hospital trust to understand the impact this harm is having not just on their patients, but also on their finances.

“And I want every nurse in the country to understand that if we work together to make the NHS the safest health care organisation in the world, we could potentially release resources for additional nurses, additional training, and additional time to care.”

He will add: “More resources should be invested in improving patient care rather than wasted on picking up the pieces when things go wrong.

“It would be tempting to set up a new target or issue a new ministerial decree. But that would be a mistake. Because the culture change we need to develop has to come from inside, not because hospitals are being forced from the outside.

“If you’re short of money, poor care is about the most wasteful and expensive thing you can do.”

Last year the NHS spent £1.3 billion on payouts after being sued by patients over care errors.

Four areas of poor patient safety highlighted by the Department of Health include falls and trips, bed ulcers, urinary infections caused by poorly fitted catheters, and deep vein thrombosis, which together cost the NHS an estimated £200 million a year in extra care.

But Dr Peter Carter, of the Royal College of Nursing, said the Government needs to invest in more staff before patient care can be improved. “Falls and preventable conditions such as pressure ulcers happen when there are not enough staff on a ward to care properly for every patient, not because nurses are unaware that these things should be prevented,” he said.

Labour health spokesman Jamie Reed said: “Under David Cameron thousands of nurses and front line staff have been lost while £3 billion has been wasted on a reckless NHS reorganisation, putting patient safety at risk.

“Labour will invest an extra £2.5 billion to recruit 20,000 more nurses — investment the Tories will not match.”