Question

Medical care can be dangerous and as healthcare workers it is our responsibility to identify, analyze and control risks for our patients and their support persons. Search the web “Hospital Risk Management” articles and provide an essay reviewing your findings.

Answer 1

Interaction of humans with health systems pose a threat to them mainly because of the complex technology, intensely complex procedures, high demand on services, time pressure, high expectations from the service users.

Adverse drug events, catheter associated urinary tract infections, patient falls, pressure ulcers, surgical site infection, central line associated infections, venous thrombo-embolism and ventilator associated pneumonia.

Proactively works to prevent situations that can result in losses or liability. In a hospital setting, situations can include patient privacy breaches; diagnostic, surgical or medication errors; and hazardous conditions.

Medical errors have become the third leading cause of death

• Step 1: Establish the context
• Step 2: Identify risks
• Step 3: Analyze risks
• Step 4: Evaluate risks
• Step 5: Treat/Manage Risks

Establish the context: It is very important in risk identification and management. The areas where there is a chance of risk in relation to patient care ICU (Intensive care unit), O.T (Operation Theater), E.W (Emergency Ward), blood transfusion services, cath-lab, medication management including pharmacy and medication administration.

Identify risks: Below are the ways to identify the risks

• Patient Tracer Activity (Tracing the journey of a patient from admission till discharge)
• Retrospective screening of patient records
• Reports of accreditation bodies
• Incident reporting system & Sentinel events
• Healthcare associated infections (HAI) reports
• Executive committee reports
• Facility management & safety committee report
• Patient complaints and satisfaction survey results
• Discussions with department Chiefs, managers and staff
• Specialized committee reports (such as Morbidity and mortality committee, medication management and use, Infection control, blood utilization, facility management and safety committee).

Analyze Risk:

When examining the existing control measures, consideration should be given to their adequacy, method of implementation and level of effectiveness in minimizing risk to the lowest reasonably practicable level.

Evaluate risk:

The purpose of risk evaluation is to prioritize the risks based on risk analysis score and to decide which risks require treatment and the mode of treatment.

Treat/Manage risk:

The decisions in risk treatment should be consistent with the defined internal, external and risk management contexts and taking account of the service objectives and goals. Risk treatment plan should have:

• Proposed actions – implements new set of rules
• Resource requirements – Issues the plan of action to all the risk resource area
• Person/s responsible for action – take assurance from the staff to implement this
• Timeframes - Dates for actions to be completed and date for review.