Reconstitute Clinical Governance Task Force Urgently, PSN, CPAN Urge FG

The Pharmaceutical Society of Nigeria (PSN) has called for the urgent reconstitution of the National Task Force on Clinical Governance, insisting that its current composition does not reflect the multidisciplinary nature of healthcare delivery and falls short of international best practice in clinical governance, patient safety, and quality outcomes.

The PSN President, Pharm. Tanko Ayuba, expressed concern that the task force is overwhelmingly physician-dominated, with 18 doctors, one pharmacist, two nurses and one administrator, a structure he said undermines equitable professional representation and risks weakening patient safety outcomes.

Pharmanews reports that the Federal Government recently inaugurated the National Task Force on Clinical Governance and Patient Safety alongside the launch of a National Patient Safety Implementation Framework aimed at improving healthcare quality, reducing avoidable patient harm, and strengthening accountability across Nigeria’s health system.

Chairman of the task force and Coordinating Minister of Health and Social Welfare, Professor Muhammadu Ali Pate, described the initiative as a deliberate, system-wide effort to improve clinical standards, patient safety and accountability across public and private health facilities. He said the task force is expected to provide leadership and coordination to embed quality and safety into everyday clinical practice nationwide.

In a related development, the Clinical Pharmacists Association of Nigeria (CPAN) has urged the Federal Government to urgently integrate clinical pharmacists into core patient-care teams across the healthcare system to reduce medication-related errors and enhance patient safety. CPAN Chairman, Dr Maureen Nwafor, noted that high-alert medicines such as sedatives and anaesthetic agents carry significant risks that demand robust checks and balances achievable only through collaborative, multidisciplinary oversight.

Dr Nwafor made the call in a letter addressed to the health minister, which was shared with Pharmanews, following recent cases of medical negligence and the inauguration of what CPAN described as a non-representative National Task Force on Clinical Governance and Patient Safety.

A former President of the PSN, Pharm. (Sir) Anthony Akhimien, also criticised the physician-centric structure of the task force, describing it as a recurring obstacle to progress in Nigeria’s health sector. In an exclusive interview with Pharmanews, he said the sector’s challenges are largely systemic and leadership-driven, noting that reforms often fail due to the dominance of a single profession in policy formulation and implementation.

He warned that the composition of the task force reinforces existing imbalances in the health system and sidelines other critical experts. According to him, healthcare delivery is inherently multidisciplinary, and excluding key professionals risks compromising patient safety. He further decried the absence of regulatory and industry stakeholders, particularly the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) and pharmaceutical industry representatives involved in clinical trials.

Akhimien argued that excluding these stakeholders would continue to fuel professional rivalry and disharmony within the health sector, with negative consequences for national health indices.

In a separate letter to the minister, the PSN President described the task force’s composition as skewed, noting that it marginalises professionals whose roles are central to medication safety, clinical risk management, diagnostic accuracy and continuity of care. He warned that such imbalance could undermine sector-wide trust, ownership and collaboration, especially as the task force’s outputs are intended for national adoption and implementation.

Ayuba stressed that clinical governance and patient safety are inherently multidisciplinary, and called for the inclusion of key pharmacy regulatory bodies, professional associations and drug safety institutions in the task force. He also recommended the appointment of a co-chair from among senior pharmacy and regulatory leadership to ensure high-level technical collaboration.

He requests for the inclusion of registrar, Pharmacy Council of Nigeria (PCN); president, Pharmaceutical Society of Nigeria (PSN); director-general, NAFDAC; chairman, Association of Hospital & Administrative Pharmacists of Nigeria (AHAPN); chairman, Association of Community Pharmacists of Nigeria (ACPN); chairman, Association of Consultant Pharmacists in Nigeria (ACPN- Consult); and chairman, PSN–National Drug Information Centre (NDIC).

Citing World Health Organisation guidance and international best practice, the PSN President emphasised that sustainable patient safety systems require substantive input from pharmacy, nursing, medical laboratory science, health information management, health administration, quality improvement professionals, as well as patient and community representatives.

He noted that the objectives of the task force are closely linked to adverse event prevention, pharmacovigilance, antimicrobial stewardship, safety standards, capacity building and quality improvement systems, adding that a more inclusive task force would strengthen technical depth, policy legitimacy, implementation efficiency and national ownership.

Ayuba maintained that reconstituting the task force to reflect professional balance would improve the quality of its outputs, deepen cross-sectoral buy-in, strengthen safety culture, facilitate nationwide rollout and ultimately deliver measurable improvements in patient safety outcomes.