Akron Children’s recently surpassed a patient safety milestone that reflects our commitment to quality and patient safety and our pursuit of zero harm.
Akron Children’s recently surpassed a significant patient safety milestone. As of Sept. 20, the organization has gone more than 571 days without a serious safety event (SSE).
Wendy Van Ittersum, MD, FAAP, medical director, patient and staff safety, said the milestone is a testament to Akron Children’s commitment to quality and patient safety and its relentless pursuit of zero harm. Prior to this record, the organization’s longest time between SSEs (defined as a variation from expected practice or care delivery that results in moderate to severe harm or death) was 513 days.
“This milestone is a tribute to the work that’s been done over many years by our team—from hospital leaders to frontline staff—and their commitment to quality and safety in our organization,” she said. “It reflects the attention given to this work as we promote a culture of safety, one where we all feel comfortable speaking up and doing what’s right to keep our patients safe.”
Dr. Van Ittersum said over the last decade, Akron Children’s has made tremendous strides to reduce its number of SSEs, and the results are visible in data tracked by the hospital and reported to Solutions for Patient Safety (SPS), a children’s health collaborative comprising more than 140 children’s hospitals across the nation.
“In 2012, when we first started doing this work and tracking our SSEs, we asked for a commitment to zero harm from everyone in our organization,” she said. “Today, we’re well below the national and statewide benchmarks.”
As part of the SPS collaborative, Akron Children’s measures and reports on safety events to other children’s hospitals throughout the state and country, so all organizations may benefit from shared safety lessons and strategies, while assessing their own level of risk for similar events.
Dr. Van Ittersum credits much of the progress to the hospital’s error prevention training.
“We’ve emphasized the need to go back to the basics and encouraged staff to utilize their fundamental error prevention skills,” she said. “Every employee, regardless of their role, goes through error prevention training within their first 90 days of employment. We’ve also developed ways to keep these tools and strategies visible, so they become part of our everyday work.
“We want staff to use best practices in communication, including introducing ourselves to new team members, asking clarifying questions and speaking up for safety. We are all accountable to ourselves and each other, and we all have an important role to play to ensure patient safety.”
Michael Bigham, MD, chief quality officer, said this achievement reflects our mission.
“A safety milestone of this magnitude is special,” said Dr. Bigham. “At Akron Children’s, we promise to treat every child as we would our own and to treat them as they’d like to be treated, and this shows how we deliver on both of those promises.
“We also know that medicine is a team sport. The defining trait of our quality and safety journey lies in our culture and the people who demonstrate that. An organizations’ safety culture defines every action, response and task. It is through this culture that trust and communication in health care can flourish, and as a result, our patients are kept safe.”
Learn more about Akron Children’s commitment to quality and patient safety.
