Better Communication for Better Diagnostic Outcomes
What follows is an interview Emily Tooley, MSN, RN, CPPS, CPHQ, representing Children’s Hospital Association (CHA). Read the full interview here.
First, tell us about the Children’s Hospital Association (CHA) and Child Health Patient Safety Organization. Why have you decided to focus on diagnostic quality and safety?
“Children’s Hospital Association, in partnership with its hospitals, strives to identify performance improvement opportunities, provide a platform for learning and best practice sharing, and collaborate with each other to advance policy on issues that have the greatest impact on child health,” says Emily Tooley. “We are the voice of over 220 children’s hospitals nationally.”
As a subsidiary of Children’s Hospital Association (CHA) since 2009, the Child Health Patient Safety Organization (PSO) is the only PSO dedicated to and designed by children’s hospitals to address patient safety issues.
“In reviewing our data, more than half of our children’s hospitals reported communication failure among the care team as a top contributor to diagnostic errors," says Emily Tooley.
What is the “Improving Communication to Enhance Diagnostic Safety Toolkit” and what are its components?
The five components of the toolkit are: case learning, team diagnostic timeout, the patient safety alert, gap analysis and additional resources.The Child Health PSO is in the process of collecting information about the use and impact of the toolkit and reduction of diagnostic error.
What are the intended outcomes for the “Improving Communication to Enhance Diagnostic Safety Toolkit”?
The intent of the toolkit is to help diagnostic teams overcome the complexity of communication, such as misinterpretation or incorrect assumption of information, to improve diagnostic outcomes.
“We are hoping to see results that would imply a shift in our understanding of causal factors in diagnostic error and help generate awareness about the harm involving diagnostic errors,” said Tooley. “The long term anticipated result is fewer patients experiencing a serious patient safety event related to diagnostic safety caused by failures in team communication.”
If you are a Coalition member and your organization would like to be featured in an upcoming Member Spotlight, please email Coalition@ImproveDiagnosis.org.
