Human factors training for the NHS
WingFactors brings the safety culture of the flight deck to NHS clinical teams. Our pilots and cabin crew help your people communicate, share workload and make better decisions under pressure, so fewer things slip through the cracks.
Working with 3 NHS trusts across 8 specialties. No obligation, we reply to every enquiry personally.
185+
Pilot Sims delivered across NHS trusts
Trusted by NHS teams. Built with clinicians.
Watch
A short introduction to how our pilots and cabin crew bring aviation safety thinking to NHS teams.
Our programmes
Both programmes are built with clinicians for the realities of NHS care. Choose the one that fits your service, or run both.
Sharper communication and decision-making under pressure
Experienced commercial pilots observe your live clinical simulations and give structured, non-judgemental human factors feedback using aviation parallels. Your team leaves with practical, memorable habits they can use on the very next shift.
Explore Pilot Sim
Calmer interactions and a stronger workplace culture
Cabin-crew-led courses help your staff de-escalate difficult moments, put anxious patients at ease and build a culture of compassion. Practical, interactive and designed around your team after a fact-finding session with your people.
Explore Patient EngagementSee it in action
From simulation suites to theatres and the ambulance bay, our pilots and cabin crew work shoulder to shoulder with NHS staff in the places care actually happens.
Pilots observing a live clinical simulation
On site with the team at the Whittington
Where the training pays off, under pressure
From the ward to the ambulance bay
Cabin-crew-led patient engagement
Our story
When COVID-19 grounded the world’s aircraft, it grounded their crews too. Furloughed pilots and cabin crew found themselves with hard-won safety expertise and nowhere to use it, just as NHS teams faced the most demanding period in their history.
So they founded WingFactors and partnered with the NHS, bringing the safety culture of the flight deck to wards, theatres and emergency departments. Because aviation and healthcare share one truth: under pressure, it is the human factors that decide the outcome.
A growing body of work delivered hand in hand with clinical teams, and trusts who keep inviting us back.
What clinicians say
The feedback from doctors and nurses in the department who have been exposed to WingFactors training has been unanimously positive and have really made people consider the way in which we do things. Many of us are actually now wondering why such important aspects of training are not routine in medicine.
Dr Anna Goose
ED Consultant
There is little doubt this project has had a hugely positive impact on our hospital. It has galvanised the training landscape and fostered a more collaborative spirit between our specialties.
Dr Robert Lloyd
EM Trainee ST6
The highly professional, structured approach by the team of pilots at WF’s who are unquestionably experts in HF’s has provided a very new and enlightening approach to running these simulations. The targeted, non-judgemental, anonymised written feedback and take home messages allow the participants to learn and remember some very important non-technical skills.
Dr Andrew Levison
Anaesthetics Consultant
Meet the team
The people behind WingFactors bring decades of flight-deck and cabin-crew experience to the NHS front line, alongside the clinicians who keep the work grounded in real care.
Short Haul Captain | CRMT
Long Haul Captain | CRMT
Patient Engagement Lead | CRMT
Clinical Wellbeing Advisor
Recognition
Recognised by the HSJ, the BMJ and the Royal Colleges for the impact of our work alongside NHS teams.
2020 · GAMC
Airway Team of the Year
HSJ
Best Education Programme for the NHS (Highly Commended)
COVID Response Awards
Best COVID Response in Healthcare (15m)
Governance and Quality Conference
Pilot Sim Presentation
2021 · Spring Acute Medicine
Pilot Sim: High Distinction
2021 · Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health (RPsych International Congress)
BMJ Abstract
2021 · Royal College of Anaesthetists
Patient Safety and Perioperative Care 2021: Best Oral Presentation
2022 · Edinburgh Anaesthesia Festival
Edinburgh Anaesthesia Festival 2022 Poster Competition: Top Prize
2022 · University of Bradford
Shortlisted for the Award for Cross-Sector Working
From the team
WingFactors Patient Engagement Team has been shortlisted for the ‘University of Bradford award for cross-sector working’. The awards ceremony is on the 1st December 2022. Find out more about the organisations shortlisted for awards here.
A fantastic achievement by Dr Eleanor Budge and Barbara O’Donnell supported by WingFactors Pilot Captain Dave Fielding, who worked tirelessly on a quality improvement project designed to streamline theatre checklists and dramatically improve compliance.
programme rolls out at Great Western Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust.
Tell us about your service and what you would like to achieve. We will come back to you personally to talk it through, with no obligation.