Patient Safety Efforts

Developing a true safety culture will include demanding that nurses be treated with respect. Organizational excellence in patient safety can never occur without implementing policies that address nursing safety, well-being, and job satisfaction. 

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Layde, P.M., Maas, L.A., Teret, S.P. etal. (2002) Patient Safety Efforts Should Focus on Medical Injuries. JAMA The Journal of the American Medical Association, 287(15), 1993-1997. 

Develop an intranet site for patient safety efforts... 

Practice to reduce radiation exposure from fluoroscopy and CT Use of simulation exercises in patient safety efforts... 

General patient safety practices can refer to any process or structure that reduce the probability of an adverse event occurring. A patient safety practice can address either clinical or nonclinical issues. Consider the following issues below that can impact patient safety efforts. 

Process improvements may be conducted by the completion of a task or a project. A task is an activity that can be completed by the process owner with minimal cost and/or resources over a short period of time. A project is defined as temporary work to provide a product or service that is beyond the process owner s support. In general, a project requires more than one full-time equivalent (FTE), crosses over multiple functional organizations, and the duration of the effort spans over a longer period of time. Improvement status, updates, and issues should be discussed on a regular basis by a management forum or steering committee. Tasks and projects should be prioritized based on the risk against patient safety and efficacy and compliance. 

In addition, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and other federal agencies formed the Quality Interagency Coordination Task Force in 2000 and issued an action plan for reducing medical errors. In 2001, former HHS Secretary Tommy G. Thompson announced a Patient Safety Task Force to coordinate a joint effort to improve data collection on patient safety. The lead agencies are the FDA, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, and the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. 

The edueation and dissemination of information is another primary objective of ISMP—Spain If everyone understands the nature and causes of medication errors, there is a much greater possibility of improving patient safety. In this sense, ISMP—Spain makes educational presentations and holds conferences at healthcare professional meetings to provide information about adverse drug events. ISMP—Spain also publishes opinion articles and practical articles in Spanish healthcare journals in an effort to broadly disseminate a culture of safety and error prevention. 

ISMP—Spain believes in the importance of coordinating efforts to enhance patient safety in countries all over the world. It is open to the creation of a work platform in Europe and also to cooperating with Spanish-speaking countries with any initiatives they may undertake to improve their medication systems. 

However, while the objective of the report, and the thrust of its recommendations, was to stimulate a national effort to improve patient safety, what initially grabbed public attention was the declaration that between 44 000 and 98 000 people die in US hospitals annually as a result of medical errors. 

Senior leaders needed to become much more visible to front line staff in their efforts to improve patient safety. 

Greater efforts were needed to involve and educate physicians about patient safety. 

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