The Role of the Patient Safety Officer

The patient safety officer is responsible for supporting the development of a culture of safety and for underscoring the integration of patient safety concepts throughout the organization.

Healthcare organizations should continuously strive to adopt patient safety initiatives designed to mitigate the risk of adverse outcomes from medical errors. These initiatives should range across the organization, from error mitigation, to care quality, to communication. Patient safety should be ingrained in the organization and should support the concept of a culture of safety.

A culture of safety includes the following characteristics:

Two further actions are at the heart of a culture of safety: the reporting and disclosure of errors. The means by which errors are identified, reported, and communicated to those involved or affected have much to do with how deeply safety is ingrained in the organization's culture. For more information on culture of safety,...