Week 2 - Introduction to Patient Safety

Question 1

Patient Safety is based in the right to respect and dignity…

Answer 1

Health care professionals have an obligation to treat all clients with respect and dignity

change in culture requires a change in mindset

A shift from the blame culture to the patient safety culture is required in today’s practice

Question 2

The Right to Keep Safe (STUDY)

Answer 2

Baker and Norton undertook a study in 2004 to determine the extent of medical errors in Canadian Hospitals which included 20 hospitals in 5 provinces

Question 3

Baker and Norton Study findings

Answer 3

Found that 1/13 of patients experienced an adverse event

Out of the 185,000 adverse events that occur in Canadian Hospitals each year, 70,000 are preventable

Question 4

Human Limitation and Human error (medical error study by Baker and Norton Study)

Answer 4

Communication breakdown, fatigue, workload, the complexity of processes, reliance on memory over checklist

Question 5

Systemic Problems (medical error study done by Baker and Norton)

Answer 5

there are systemic problems rather than individual acts and historically there has been a tendency to blame individuals for errors and adverse events