Guide · checked October 2026

NatSSIPs in the cath lab: safety checks for invasive procedures

NatSSIPs 2, published by the Centre for Perioperative Care in January 2023, covers all invasive procedures including those outside the operating department, so it applies to cath labs; the original 2015 standards named cardiac catheterisation, angioplasty and stenting explicitly and set out steps from safety briefing through sign in, time out and sign out to debriefing.

What NatSSIPs is

NHS England published the National Safety Standards for Invasive Procedures in September 2015. The Centre for Perioperative Care published NatSSIPs 2 in January 2023. NHS England says NatSSIPs 2 covers all invasive procedures, including those performed outside the operating department, re-launches the WHO checklist approach with key stop moments, and adds proportionate counts for more minor procedures. The standards are high level: providers write their own detailed local procedures from them.

The steps (from the 2015 standards)

Site marking, where relevant.
Safety briefing.
Sign in.
Time out.
Prosthesis or implant verification.
Prevention of retained foreign objects.
Sign out.
Debriefing.

The 2015 document's scope explicitly included cardiac catheterisation, angioplasty and stent insertion, and named cardiac catheter laboratories as procedure areas. It allowed sign in and time out to be combined for local anaesthetic procedures without sedation. Use your local procedures and the NatSSIPs 2 text for the current detail.

Pre-case readiness

Many checklist failures start before the patient arrives: allergy status not recorded, an anticoagulant without a last dose, an old renal result. Resolving these on the list the day before makes the sign in quicker and the time out more meaningful.

What NatSSIPs is not

Not only for theatres: NatSSIPs 2 covers procedures outside the operating department.
Not a fixed form: local procedures are written from the standards.
Not replaced by software: the stop moments are team conversations.

Where Cath Copilot fits

Cath Copilot's pre-case brief shows every field with the record it came from, and deterministic local rules flag gaps such as an unrecorded allergy status, an anticoagulant with no documented last dose, or a stale renal result, for a person to resolve, assign or escalate. It supports readiness; it does not run or replace your sign in, time out or sign out.

Cath Copilot is a prototype on synthetic data only. It is not a medical device and is not for clinical use.

Questions

Does NatSSIPs apply to cath labs?

Yes. NHS England says NatSSIPs 2 covers all invasive procedures including those outside the operating department, and the 2015 standards named cardiac catheterisation explicitly.

Who published NatSSIPs 2?

The Centre for Perioperative Care, in January 2023.

Sources

Official pages, checked October 2026. Guidance changes, so check the current version before you rely on it.

General information for healthcare managers and clinical teams, checked October 2026. It is not legal, regulatory or clinical advice; follow the current official guidance and your organisation's own policies. No patient data is used in these examples. Cath Copilot is a prototype running on synthetic data only. It is not a medical device and is not for clinical use. It recommends, drafts, and routes; it never diagnoses, orders, or decides. A clinical safety and information-governance process precedes any use with real patient data.