9 ways to improve patient safety in your office
1. Conduct an inventory of risk areas.
One risk assessment tool is available to members on the Medical Group Management Asso-ciation (MGMA) Web site. "We encourage people who are in an office-based practice to go through the self assessment program. Some people have told me that the program alone is worth the cost of membership," says William Jessee, MD, MGMA president and CEO.
2. Develop a flowchart of processes that occur in your office from the time a patient calls for an appointment until they walk out the door.
Go through the flowchart of office processes and look at all the areas where something could go wrong. Include how patients are triaged, how long it takes for them to get an appointment, what happens when they walk through your parking lot. Review the flowchart of a patient who comes in contact of your practice and determine what could lead to a breakdown in the system that would injure patients.
3. Examine your office for patient safety problems.
Include access to drugs or sharps, the type of seating in your waiting room, and what hazards patients may encounter walking through your office. Check the parking lot to make sure it is safe. For instance, when the weather is cold, make sure the parking lot and walkways are clear of ice and snow.
4. Discuss patient safety issues at staff meetings and keep staff aware of the issue.
Keep the lines of communication open among all the staff, and make them aware of patient safety concerns.
5. Urge your patients to come in with a list written questions.
See that they check off the list when the questions are answered. The questions and answers should also become part of the patient record, Rozovsky suggests.
6. Encourage your patients to call if they think there is a problem.
Make sure patients with chronic conditions don’t wait to call until the problem is exacerbated. Make sure patients know there is no such thing as a dumb question.
7. Give your patients times when they can call and get a reply.
Make sure your practice has the right person taking calls. The patients may prefer talking to the nurse practitioner or physician assistant. If it’s a complex problem, that person could refer the patient’s call to the doctor.
8. Keep your internal communications flowing well so everything can be documented.
For instance, if a patient calls after hours, the patient’s questions or problem and your response must be documented in the records. If you have evening clinics, the staff should have access to the patient records.
9. Investigate the latest technology to see if it will work for you.
Technology has the potential to cut down on medical errors, particularly when it’s a case of poor physician handwriting, dosage errors, or lost records.
"There is no question that many of the most glaring safety issues relate to the lack of computerized systems for capturing information," Jessee says. For instance, it’s harder to lose test results in an electronic file than in a paper file.
"The new emphasis on safety issues has given visibility to the importance of information management," Jessee says. However, he points out that right now most of the medical information systems are fragmented.
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