Healthcare organizations use trigger tools to identify potential errors or adverse events in the electronic health record (EHR), measure the frequency of errors, and track safety improvements. Three hospitals in Germany conducted a feasibility study of implementing the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI) Global Trigger Tool (GTT) in two general surgery units and one neurosurgery unit. Twenty-two feasibility criteria were developed (low-, moderate-, problematic-level of challenge) which may help guide successful implementation of the GTT.

Correctly reporting, interpreting, and comparing patient safety culture (PSC) survey findings is critical to improving patient safety in hospitals. Nearly 1,800 physicians and nurses were surveyed using the Hospital Survey on Patient Safety Culture (HSOPS) to examine the influence of gender, profession, and managerial function on perception of patient safety culture. Results indicate that profession and managerial function had significant direct effects, while gender had indirect effects, on the Overall Perception of Patient Safety dimension. Hospitals should take these characteristics into account when interpreting PSC survey results.  

… BMJ Open … BMJ Open … Effective teamwork is a critical component of care coordination and patient safety. …

… from the health care team's perspective . Researchers used a large online survey to develop and validate an 11-item … scale to measure patients' perception of safety culture. A recent Annual Perspective explored the growing field of …

… Res Social Adm Pharm … Failure mode and effect analysis is a tool commonly used to proactively assess the reliability of …

This narrative review found that failure mode and effect analysis and sociotechnical probabilistic risk assessment have both been applied to medication dispensing. These methods have led to corrective actions that enhance medication safety. The authors recommend wider use of these tools across inpatient and outpatient health care settings.

Interruptions are known to contribute to medication administration errors. This pre–post study found that nurses experienced fewer interruptions and made fewer medication errors following the introduction of a separate medication room. These results demonstrate how changing the work environment can promote safety.

Teamwork and clinician well-being have important implications for patient safety. Researchers conducted a systematic review of the literature and found evidence supporting independent relationships between teamwork, clinician well-being, and patient safety. The authors propose a framework that addresses current limitations and suggest that further research is needed to better understand the causal relationships between the three concepts.

… Crit Care … Crit Care … Emotional exhaustion is a component of burnout —a critical patient safety issue. Teamwork promotes resilience … how teamwork, burnout, and patient safety interact in a safety culture . This prospective study of critical care …

In this study, health care organizations that have quality management systems in place had higher safety culture scores than those without such systems. As with prior studies, leaders expressed more positive safety culture than frontline clinicians. This work suggests that ongoing investment in safety culture is needed.

This Swiss study sought to determine the relationship between elements of clinician burnout and mortality, length of stay, and ratings of patient safety. The authors found that clinicians demonstrating symptoms of burnout had lower perceptions of patient safety in the intensive care unit. However, higher levels of burnout among clinicians were not linked to clinical outcomes.

This survey examined the barriers to incident reporting faced by nurses and physicians in Switzerland.

… that clinicians' subjective impressions and concerns were a critical component of a high-quality transfer of care and were considered more …

… any handoff interventions to better patient outcomes. A case of poor handoff communication that led to an avoidable …

Exploring team mental models in health care, this review identifies gaps in the evidence base that should be addressed to improve its application.

… key organizational factors that help hospitals establish a comprehensive clinical risk management service. …

This study reports on the development of a standardized tool to assess the quality of handoffs. The tool was used to evaluate handoffs in the emergency department, operating room, and general hospital wards.