Royal Brompton & Harefield NHS Foundation Trust has comprehensive tissue governance systems in place, overseen by the following groups/people.
Trust Board / Human Tissue Authority (HTA) licence holder
The Trust board is the HTA licence holder and therefore has overall responsibility, in conjunction with the designated individual (DI) named on each licence, for ensuring suitable management of tissue.
Governance committees
Tissue governance is applicable to three board-level committees:
- Governance and quality committee, which ensures quality of care and patient safety
- Research management committee, which oversees all research
Tissue governance steering group
The tissue governance steering group is a cross-site multi-professional group at the heart of the Trust's tissue governance. The group was established in 2005 to oversee the development and implementation of systems for governing tissue, to ensure the Trust and its allied research partner, Imperial College London, are meeting legal and regulatory requirements.
Tissue governance manager
A tissue governance manager has been appointed at the Trust within the quality and safety team, to oversee high-level compliance with the HTA’s licensing requirements and tissue governance frameworks. The tissue governance manager works to ensure that relevant statutory and regulatory requirements across all licensable sectors are met, and issues are resolved in a timely manner. The tissue governance manager provides training and support to all staff conducting licensable activities.
HTA licensing
The Human Tissue Act sets out a requirement for a DI to take on statutory responsibility for securing that:
- suitable practices are used in undertaking the licensed activity
- the other persons who work under the licence are suitable
- the conditions of the licence are complied with
Royal Brompton & Harefield NHS Foundation Trust's DIs are:
- research and human application – Professor John Pepper
- post mortem – Professor Andrew Nicholson
Persons designated (PDs) assist the DIs in fulfilling their statutory responsibility, by deputising for them and overseeing practices in a local area. The PDs help ensure the Trust's governance system is complied with across all licensed sites. In this role, they are able to provide local support and information to staff operating on their premises. A list of PDs can be found on the contacts page.