To determine if a healthcare facility puts patients at risk, many hospitals are adopting the practice of conducting safety surveys, according to an article on the FacilityCare website.
One patient safety survey is the Hospital Survey on Patient Safety Culture, which is free to hospitals from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ). AHRQ makes the results of the surveys available on a comparative database.
Though formal surveys enable facilities to compare progress consistently over several years, informal surveys and interviews with staff and patients can yield more in-depth discussions on safety, the article said.
Informal surveys can be conducted by leadership during patient safety rounds. During these rounds, the executive team visits different patient care units to discuss safety with department heads and staff.
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