Workplace violence in the health care setting is common and poses an ongoing risk for providers and staff. The Joint Commission issued a sentinel event alert to raise awareness about the risks associated with physical and verbal violence against health care workers and suggests numerous strategies organizations can use to address the problem, including establishing reporting systems and developing quality improvement interventions. The authors describe a quality improvement initiative involving the development and iterative testing of a huddle handoff tool to optimize communication between the emergency department (ED) and an admitting unit regarding patients with the potential for violent behavior. The huddle tool led to improved perceptions of safety during the patient transfer process by both the ED nurses and the admitting medical units. An accompanying editorial highlights the importance of taking a systems approach to address workplace safety. A PSNet perspective explored how a medical center developed a process to identify, prioritize, and mitigate hazards in health care settings.

Voluntary error reporting systems are an important part of safety improvement programs, but difficulty in analyzing error reports has limited their utility. This study described the development of a machine learning algorithm to analyze free-text data in incident reports. The algorithm proved to be accurate in classifying events when compared to manual review.

This commentary examines the progress in the past 5 years regarding establishing poorly managed pain in pediatric patients as an adverse event. The authors recommend using trigger tools and other surveillance methods to track and report on outcomes associated with pain management.

Electronic health records (EHRs) can improve and hinder the safety of care delivery. This commentary describes how existing data was used to develop a tool to measure unintended consequences of EHRs, which can help inform enhancements to EHR implementation.

Patients are increasingly being asked to assume a role in ensuring their own safety. Both AHRQ's "20 Tips to Help Prevent Medical Errors" and the Joint Commission's "Speak Up" program to ensure surgical safety recommend that patients engage in specific safety practices, such as maintaining a list of their medications and asking health care workers if they have washed their hands. This survey assessed the willingness of patients to carry out these practices. Patients were much less likely to engage in behaviors that required them to challenge providers (such as checking for handwashing compliance) than less confrontational practices (such as following up on test results). The study's findings are similar to a prior AHRQ-funded study of patients recently discharged from the hospital.

This study examined instances of wrong-site surgery reported to authorities in Pennsylvania and sought to determine factors contributing to the error.