How did we get here?

Over the last few years the topic of patient safety has become an increasing priority amongst governments, health institutions and even insurance companies, as we all seek to reduce the human and financial costs of incidents.

On this part of our web site we want to share with you what happened and how the patient safety issue materialized. Look also at the section patient safety links and news for the more recent news!

The mother of all reports

From an international point of view the report “To Err Is Human: Building a Safer Health System” is arguably one the most influential report on creating the awareness around the subject of patient safety, the horror of adverse events and the size of the problem.

The report was published by the Institute of Medicine (IOM) in 1999 called for a national effort to make health care safer in the USA. The report seems to have stimulated research and discussion about patient safety issues. We certainly think all managers and quality executives in the health care should have read this report. Whether the report will translate into safer patient care, is a responsibility of all of us!

Click here  to check out the report.

The World Health Organization

In October 2004, WHO launched the World Alliance for Patient Safety in response to a World Health Assembly Resolution (2002) urging WHO and Member States to pay the closest possible attention to the problem of patient safety.

Today this alliance raises awareness and political commitment to improve the safety of care and facilitates the development of patient safety policy and practice in all WHO Member States. Each year, the Alliance delivers a number of programs covering systemic and technical aspects to improve patient safety around the world.

Check out www.who.int.

The focus in Europe

The European Conference entitled “Patient safety – Making it happen” held in Luxembourg-Kirchberg (2005) identified the interests and challenges from a European perspective. The aims were of sharing best practices and experiences, bolstering debate and political dialogue.

The Conference adopted a “Luxembourg Statement on Patient Safety”, which listed a number of recommendations and was later delivered to an ad hoc sub-group of the High Level Group on Health, consisting of senior officials from all EU Member States.

Read more on www.eu2005.lu.

What happens in the Benelux

In 2004 more then 1700 patients died as a result of adverse events in Dutch hospitals. This was the startling result of the investigation: ‘Unintentional damage in Dutch hospitals’ of the EGMO Institute (Institute for Research in Extramural Medicine) and the NIVEL (Dutch Institute for Research of the Healthcare).

In 2007 national organizations of hospitals, medical specialists and nurses presented the safety program ‘Prevent damage, work safe’. The intention of the program is to reduce the number of avoidable deaths and other damage by 50% within the next 5 years.
 
In Belgium during 2006, a vast research was initiated by the Federal Commission Patient Safety with support of the University of Leuven, resulting in strong recommendation for both the government as well as the health care sector. The government continues to work on a long term plan with clearly defined step-by-step procedures to enhance quality and patient safety.

One of these is the availability of an institution wide ‘adverse events reporting and learning system’, often referred to as ‘Clinical Risk Management.’