In the final white paper in our Culture of Safety Series, we look at how understanding high reliability organizations (HROs), change, and human behavior can help drive effective cultures of safety. Adapting characteristics of HROs to healthcare settings and carefully choosing change strategies will not only help drive improvements within an organization, but also nurture a safe culture.

Read: Part III: Effective Change for Quality Improvement

To learn more about creating a culture of safety, read Part I, Embracing Patient Safety Culture, and Part II, Awareness & Assessment of Safety Culture.

A new report from the National Patient Safety Foundation's Lucian Leape Institute, Shining a Light: Safer Health Care Through Transparency, offers more than 30 recommendations for healthcare leaders, clinicians, patients and regulatory bodies to increase transparency and improve patient safety outcomes. The report stems from roundtable discussions involving a variety of stakeholders and perspectives, and focuses on four domains of transparency: clinicians and patients; clinicians and their peers; healthcare organizations with one another; and both clinicians and organizations with the public. 
 

View the report.

The traditional framework of only caring for patients in the hospital setting is fading, and facilities such as Ambulatory Surgery Centers are growing in popularity. To manage the influx of patients and to create safer environments, it is important these settings put more emphasis on managing risks and implement integrated risk, quality and safety strategies. 

In a new white paper, we discuss the key pieces to mitigating surgical medical malpractice exposures and enhancing patient safety in Ambulatory Surgery Centers.

Read: Mitigating Surgical Medical Malpractice Exposure in Ambulatory Surgery Centers

Root Cause Analysis (RCA) is widely used by healthcare professionals to analyze errors and see why they occurred. Many agree, though, there are inconsistencies in the success of these initiatives. To improve the RCA process, the National Patient Safety Foundation (NPSF) brought together a group of stakeholders and subject matter experts to review best practices and develop a set of guidelines. The resulting report focuses on actions, making the new process what they call "RCA squared."

Download the guidelines, RCA²: Improving Root Cause Analyses and Actions to Prevent Harm. 
  

Clarity recently held a forum on cyber risk to educate its clients and raise awareness about this important subject. During the workshop, the attendees took the driver seat to analyze threats, identify the steps they would need to take if a threat became an incident, and discuss prevention strategies. Our speaker Mac McMillan, FHIMSS, CISM of CynergisTek, Inc. also facilitated lively discussions between the participants who shared their questions as well as some of their own best practices.

Whether you are big or small, healthcare or not, cyber risk affects us all. To start or continue the discussion at your organization, here are a few-eye opening statistics from our speaker and additional resources related to cyber risk:

• Infographic: Healthcare Data Breaches
• Internet Security Threat Report
• Hospitals Battle Data Breaches With a Cybersecurity SOS
• Phishing Attack and Awareness
• 7 Steps to Securing Healthcare Infrastructures Using a Cloud Security Plan
• Improving Health Data Security With a 'Sandbox' Approach

Technology is transforming healthcare, and it can be difficult to keep up with the latest terms and trends. Managed Healthcare Executive put together a handy guide for executives, but their list is helpful to anyone who wants to know and understand the latest technology buzzwords. 

Read: Eight Health IT Terms Healthcare Executives Must Know

ASHRM's Healthcare Risk Management Week, which recently concluded, is an annual campaign that raises awareness about the critical role healthcare risk managers and safety professionals play in patient safety and patient safety care practices, quality assurance, safe work environments and liability.

In honor of this important week, we would like to recognize and thank all of you who work hard every day to reduce risk and improve patient safety. Thank you!

Healthcare has changed, which means priorities, goals and concerns have changed. Whether your organization is going through a merger, developing an ACO structure, building a culture of safety, or facing a different challenge, this is an important time to develop new strategies and approaches that will improve your operations and ensure the safety of your patients.

At Clarity, we believe in the power of information and education, so we seized the opportunity to host a Patient Safety Summit for our clients and tackle these issues.  
  

The Summit was about managing the many challenges healthcare providers are facing while never losing sight of patient care. It brought together operational and clinical leadership from across the country to discuss how to add new and innovative initiatives within their healthcare delivery systems and create a culture of safety in the process. The day included presentations from senior healthcare leadership and activities to connect participants from different settings and inspire them to return to their organizations and enact one small change that will impact the future of their systems. 

The day was a huge success and we look forward to hosting many more educational forums.

Have you heard about Clarity's Claims Consulting Services?

Clarity has experienced claims consultants that can assist you in aggressively managing your general and professional liability claims to help you reduce exposure and promote your institution's financial integrity. Whether you are in need of improving your current claims management program or developing a new one, we offer a broad range of solutions that are tailored to meet your needs. 

To learn more, contact us or download our brochure.

According to an upcoming Institute of Medicine (IOM) report on diagnostic error in healthcare, diagnostic error is the leading cause of medical malpractice claims in the US and contributes to an estimated 40,000 - 80,000 deaths each year. 

To highlight this report's important findings, the Society to Improve Diagnosis in Medicine (SIDM) is raising funds to conduct a national outreach campaign to bring attention to the report and increase the awareness about this issue. Clarity Group is proud to be a listed supporter of this campaign and hopes that by spreading the message, we can bring about change and work toward reducing diagnostic errors and improving patient safety. 

For more information on the campaign and the upcoming report, visit SIDM's website.