Exploring patient participation in reducing health-care-related safety risks

Exploring patient participation in reducing health-care-related safety risks
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African Partnerships for Patient Safety
African Partnerships for Patient Safety, a bidirectional initiative working with hospital-tohospital
partnerships between the WHO African Region and Europe, focusing on patient
safety, was launched in 2009. The programme is framed around 12 patient safety action areas
endorsed by the WHO African Region. Partnership experiences are utilized to stimulate
national system change through close working with ministries of health. The partnership
provided a clear mechanism to translate policy on patient safety to action at the point of care.
The programme is now working in 14 African and 3 European Member States.
Research for Patient Safety
Research for Patient Safety (4) is undertaking global prevalence studies on adverse effects
and developing a rapid assessment tool for use in developing countries. Major research
projects have been implemented in 13 developing and transitional Member States to
understand the nature of patient harm and to develop measurement tools. Two rounds of
the Small Grants for Patient Safety Research, launched in June 2008, involved 25 research
projects in 22 countries, aiming to build capacity in this area. A global set of priority areas
for additional research has been identified, as well as a series of methodological and training
guides. The online series of patient safety research courses and materials has involved
thousands of participants and is delivered in English, French, Spanish and Portuguese.
International Classification for Patient Safety
The WHO Patient Safety Programme developed the International Framework for Patient
Safety to capture the knowledge domain for patient safety and to serve as the basis for
the International Classification for Patient Safety and other data collection efforts (5).
The classification aims to define, harmonize and group patient safety concepts into an
internationally agreed classification. This will help to elicit, capture and analyse factors
relevant to patient safety in a manner conducive to learning and system improvement.
Reporting and Learning
The Reporting and Learning initiative aims to generate best practices for existing and
new reporting systems and to facilitate early learning from information available across
organizations running reporting systems. WHO has produced draft guidelines on
adverse event reporting and learning systems (6). Based on the International Framework
for Patient Safety, WHO aims to produce guidance on an information model for patient
safety, which will advance the draft guidelines on adverse event reporting and learning
systems. WHO currently hosts the WHO Reporting and Learning Community of
Practice, jointly supported by the Canadian Patient Safety Institute.
Solutions for Patient Safety
The Solutions for Patient Safety programme (7) developed aide memoirs highlighting
interventions and policy actions to improve patient safety. This patient safety programme
is no longer being pursued.
Eliminating central line-associated BSIs
WHO will ensure that the results of the work in the State of Michigan (United States)
to eliminate central line-associated BSIs are disseminated and the work replicated in
other settings. This could change the lives of tens of thousands of patients worldwide,