(WHO) Patient Safety Curriculum Guide - CAIPE

How to assess the capacity of faculty
to integrate patient safety teaching into
the existing curriculum
One of the biggest challenges facing all health
professions is the growing shortage of workplace
teachers generally. There are few who know how
to integrate patient safety principles and concepts
into structured teaching in a new area and many
will find the content unfamilar. Many health
professionals intuitively adopt patient safety
methods into their everyday practice, but may not
know how to articulate what they do. This may
be because they view any discussions about
“systems” as the province of administrators
and managers. Others may not think patient
safety teaching important or relevant to their area
of practice but patient safety concerns everybody.
Most health-care professionals today would be
conscious of the need for patient safety, but
because this area is so new to curriculum,
engaging health-care professionals will be
the first challenge for you. Building capacity
of the faculty can take time, but there are
a number of steps that can be taken to engage
clinicians in patient safety teaching.
Survey
One way to find out who is interested in teaching
patient safety is to conduct a survey of those
who teach students. In some institutions there
may be hundreds of teachers and in others not
so many. Identify the persons who are in the best
position to incorporate patient safety teaching
and ensure that they are included in the survey.
The mapping exercise described above will help
identify faculty staff who currently teach and are
in a position to integrate patient safety concepts.
The survey could include questions related to
an interest or knowledge of patient safety
and practice in patient safety methods. This
process could also identify persons interested
in forming a group or committee to oversee
the development of the patient safety curriculum
in your particular profession.
Focus group
Run a focus group of health professionals from
your particular profession to find out what
the current state of knowledge is about patient
safety. This will also provide information about
their attitudes towards patient safety learning
in the curriculum.
Face-to-face meetings
Individual meetings with faculty staff and
workplace teachers from your profession will help
to convey a clear message about patient safety
education. This provides an opportunity to explain
the basis and urgency for patient safety education
as well as to establish a relationship for later work.
Convene a round table
Invite a select group of people from your
profession who you think may be interested
and might be possible role models or
“champions” to participate to a round table
discussion about patient safety education for
students. (The benefit of a round table format
is that there is no one expert obviously in charge
and the group seeks to discuss and resolve
the issues together in a collegial fashion.)
Conduct a seminar on patient safety
Seminars are typical venues for building new
knowledge. Seminars are useful for exposing
practitioners new to the area as, well as to experts
or respected practitioners who are knowledgeable
about patient safety. Seminars can either be
a half-day or a full day. Topics could include:
(i) what is patient safety?; (ii) the evidence
of why patient safety is important; (iii) how to
develop a curriculum for patient safety; (iv) how
to teach patient safety; and (v) how to assess
patient safety. It is important to remember
to maintain the aim of the programme, which
is to build capacity for faculty staff and
professionals to teach patient safety to students.
How to identify like-minded colleagues
or associates
If you undertake the activities set out above in
relation to building capacity, this will help identify
like-minded people interested in teaching patient
safety. Another way is to convene a meeting
and send an open invitation to faculty staff and
teachers. Make sure to schedule the meeting at
a time convenient for as many people as possible
in order to attract maximum attendance (e.g.
some professions who see patients during the day
may want to come, but cannot because of work
demands). Another way is to put an article in the
faculty or university newsletter. This will let people
know about patient safety, and even if they are
not interested in getting involved, the article
will raise awareness of the need to include patient
safety education in the curriculum.
Patient safety teaching requires the person
responsible for implementing the programme
to engage interested and knowledgeable health
professionals who have identified themselves
or have been appointed or nominated as a result
of previous contacts or meetings about patient
safety. It is also a good idea to check the
availability of experts from other faculties and
disciplines, such as engineering (human factors
39 Part A 5. Imlementing the Curriculum Guide