Authors
Abstract
Objectives: improving patient safety culture in healthcare organization is the first step for reducing medical errors and improvement of patient safety. This study was conducted to survey the patient safety culture based on staff point of views in Sabzevar hospitals.
Methods: This cross-sectional and descriptive study was conducted during July- September 2011, by using Hospital Survey Of Patient Safety Culture questionnaire (HSOPSC). 385 of clinical staff (physicians, nurses, midwives and stuff working in lab and radiology departments) as census were included in the study. The patient safety culture questionnaire was used for data collection.
Results: “teamwork within unit” and “organizational learning - continuous improvement” had the highest percentages of positive responses with respectively 73.65 ± 6.4 % and 69.16 ± 8.7 % whereas “nonpunitive response” to errors (13.03 ± 7.1%) and “staffing” ( 22.37 ± 6%) had the chosen lowest percentages of positive responses. 89% of staff noted that they have not reported any medical errors during past 12 months. Only 31% of staff reported the patient safety status in their units as excellent or very good.
Conclusion: Hospitals can attempt to create safety environment for patients by applying the strengths of their patient safety culture and removing the weaknesses. Therefore hospitals should eliminate the staff fear of blame for their mistakes and create an atmosphere of open communications and continuous learning.
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