Assignment: Patient Safety Goals HLT 313
Assignment: Patient Safety Goals HLT 313
Pick one area of the current National Patient Safety Goals program and forecast what might change in that area due to technological or other advancements in 2020. Consider, for example, patient identification standards, communication processes, and infection control protocols.
To support your response, you must use and cite at least two references.
HLT-313v Week 3 Discussion Topic 3
You should proofread your paper. However, do not rely solely on your computer’s spell-checker and grammar-checker; failure to do so indicates a lack of effort on your part, and your grade will suffer as a result. Papers with a high number of misspelled words and grammatical errors will be penalized. Before submitting your paper, go over it in silence and then aloud, and make any necessary changes. It is often beneficial to have a friend proofread your paper for obvious errors. Uncorrected mistakes are preferable to handwritten corrections.
Ensuring that every patient is safe and free from hazards should be a priority in every hospital. Every facility should have policies to follow if the safety of patients is at risk or has been compromised. In this essay, I will discuss patient safety, risk prevention and risk management. I will further describe how the three work together with the focus of decreasing harm to patients and reducing resultant claims.
Patient Safety
The World Health Organization (WHO) describes patient safety as the absence of avoidable harm inflicted on a patient during care. Patient safety also involves decreasing the risk of preventable harm related to health care to the minimum acceptable level (WHO, 2017). To safeguard and improve patients’ safety in the provision of health care, organizations should formulate policies and scientific information that promote safety practices (Sujan et al., 2015). Additionally, employing skilled health providers and actively involving patients in their plan of care significantly helps in sustaining and improving patient safety.
Risk Prevention
Health organizations and staff should prevent risks to the least possible level. Hazards that pose a risk in health care are classified as biological, chemical, physical and mechanical (Tamers et al., 2019). The hazards put patients and staff at risk of acquiring nosocomial infections, accidents, and injuries. Nevertheless, the risks can be prevented by having clear guidelines on infection prevention and control, prevention of medical errors and safety precautions (Sujan et al., 2015). For instance, infection prevention can be practiced by having guidelines on aseptic technique practice, hand washing and using protective equipment such as gowns and gloves (Tamers et al., 2019). Safety precautions help prevent injuries and accidents such as falls and fire in health facilities.
Risk Management
Risk management involves quality and safety improvement of health services through the identification of conditions that pose a risk to patients and prevention or control of the risks (Alam, 2016). The process of risk management in health care includes identifying the risk, assessing the severity and rate of recurrence. In addition, the risk identified is eliminated or reduced to the acceptable minimum (Alam, 2016). Lastly, an assessment is conducted on the expenses saved when the risk is reduced and on the amount it will cost if the risk occurs. It is crucial that organizations have a risk management team whose roles is to conduct a risk assessment, design and implement a plan on risk management (Alam, 2016). The team further oversees the implementation of the plan by the staff to reduce exposure to hazards.
Decreasing Patient Harm and Mitigating Resultant Claims
Focusing on patient safety, risk prevention and risk management in a health organization help in decreasing harm to patients (WHO 2017). Health professionals should uphold the ethic of ‘Do no harm’, and this can be accomplished by preventing health risks that may deteriorate patients’ condition. Besides, if a patient is harmed during care, the patient can sue the facility (Sujan et al., 2015). Having a risk management plan ensures that patient care is not compromised, reduces liability cases and helps prevent fiscal losses.
Conclusion
To sum it up, health organizations should ensure that preventable harm to patients is reduced to an acceptable minimum. To safeguard patients’ safety, facilities should have guidelines on risk prevention that should be followed by the staff. In addition, a risk management team’s role in an organization is to identify risks, design and oversee the implementation of a risk management plan. This helps to a great extent in reducing harm to patients and mitigating financial loss due to claims.
References
Alam, A. Y. (2016). Steps in the process of risk management in healthcare. J Epid Prev Med, 2(2), 118.
Sujan, M., Spurgeon, P., Cooke, M., Weale, A., Debenham, P., & Cross, S. (2015). The development of safety cases for healthcare services: practical experiences, opportunities and challenges. Reliability Engineering & System Safety, 140, 200-207.
Tamers, S. L., Chosewood, L. C., Childress, A., Hudson, H., Nigam, J., & Chang, C. C. (2019). Total Worker Health® 2014–2018: The Novel Approach to Worker Safety, Health, and Well-Being Evolves. International journal of environmental research and public health, 16(3), 321.
World Health Organization. (2017). Patient safety: making health care safer (No. WHO/HIS/SDS/2017.11). World Health Organization.