Contact: Joseph Pixler
(312) 422-3987

Special Journal Provides Valuable Guidance for Patient Safety

Patient safety is addressed in the current issue of the Journal for Healthcare Risk Management.

Titled "Approaches to Patient Safety: The Risk Management Perspective," the special issue devotes 84 pages to critical patient safety topics, such as the risk manager's role in the following:

• Meeting the challenges of patient safety through the design of a new risk management process;
• Creating an organizational patient safety strategy;
• Disclosing medical errors; and
• Producing an unanticipated outcome disclosure policy.

"This Journal for Healthcare Risk Management is an excellent resource for both ideas to implement immediately as well as strategies to develop over the long term," said Geri Amori, president of ASHRM.

The issue was edited by Grena G. Porto, RN, MS, CPHRM, DFASHRM.

Several articles contributed by ASHRM members describe their institutions' successes in developing non-punitive cultures, teamwork training, and community report cards on clinical outcomes.

Common fallacies clouding attitudes and practices on patient safety are tackled, as well. For example:

• Fallacy: Patients don't really want to know about errors in their care
• Fact: Patients have always wanted to know the truth about their medication and care, even including disclosure and explanation of minor errors.

Individual copies of "Approaches to Patient Safety, the Risk Management Perspective" are available for $25 now. Visit the online store to order a copy of this publication.