Patient Safety Initiative: A Collaborative Effort to Enhance Healthcare QualityPatient Safety Initiative: A Collaborative Effort to Enhance Healthcare Quality Patient safety remains paramount for healthcare providers, prompting the American Hospital Association (AHA) to launch the Patient Safety Initiative (PSI) in 2023. This nationwide initiative signifies the unwavering commitment of hospitals and health systems to improve quality, performance, and outcomes for patients and families. The PSI fosters collaboration among healthcare providers across the nation. Hospitals gain access to tools and data that empower them to enhance patient safety, share improvement stories, and highlight actionable innovations. Over 1,500 hospitals have joined PSI, demonstrating their dedication to safety and knowledge sharing. PSI’s 2024 focus areas include promoting a safety culture throughout healthcare organizations, addressing safety disparities, and enhancing workforce safety. To support these endeavors, AHA has released valuable resources, including: * Quality Collective Report: This report shares insights and best practices from healthcare quality leaders on redefining the concept of quality and shaping the future of healthcare. * Safety Speaks Podcast Series: Featuring interviews with patient safety experts, this podcast provides insights on innovative solutions for improving safety. * Focus on Safety at AHA Leadership Summit: The upcoming summit will include sessions on quality and patient safety, offering opportunities to learn from experts and gain practical strategies. Participation in PSI affirms healthcare organizations’ commitment to excellence and a continuous pursuit of improvement. By joining this initiative, hospitals and health systems benefit from webinars, resources, peer connections, and the collective wisdom of the field. Patient safety will always be the cornerstone of healthcare. The AHA, through the Patient Safety Initiative, empowers hospitals and health systems to strive for excellence and deliver the highest quality care for all patients.
Patient safety is the highest priority for every healthcare provider. Hospitals and health systems never stop looking for ways to improve quality, performance and outcomes for the individuals and families who entrust them with their care.
The spirit of patient care excellence is the driving force behind the AHA’s Patient Safety Initiative, launched in late 2023 as a national effort to affirm hospital and health system leadership and commitment to patient safety.
The initiative is a collaborative force for healthcare providers across the country, providing hospitals with tools and data to improve patient safety, providing a platform to share their stories of improvements with colleagues, and highlighting examples of actionable innovations that support, spread, and sustain safety improvements.
Currently, more than 1,500 hospitals have signed up to participate in the PSI, demonstrating not only their own commitment to improving safety, but also their willingness to share knowledge with others and benefit from the experiences of others in return.
PSI’s 2024 focus areas include advancing a safety culture from the boardroom to the bedside, identifying and addressing safety inequities, and improving workforce safety.
Meanwhile, AHA has released new resources to help hospitals and health systems continue to improve their patient safety efforts. These include:
Quality collective report — The AHA released a new report this week that highlights lessons and best practices from the AHA’s Quality Collective, a group of some of the brightest minds in healthcare quality leadership who came together last year to design strategies that not only address the field’s current needs but also shape its course into the future. Their work highlights a dynamic shift in the definition of quality, with a majority acknowledging a change or evolution over the past three years. These findings underscore the transformative nature of healthcare organizations as they respond to the changing landscape.
Safety Speaks Podcast Series — AHA’s Patient Safety Initiative recently launched a new podcast series featuring conversations with leaders in patient safety efforts. The first podcast featured a conversation between AHA Chief Nursing Officer Robyn Begley, DNP, and Trinity Health Chief Safety Officer and Vice President Tom Peterson, MD, discussing innovative patient safety solutions. New episodes will be released throughout the summer.
Focus on Safety at AHA Leadership Summit — Our July 21-23 meeting in San Diego this year will feature a number of sessions focused on quality and patient safety. Sessions will focus on board engagement in quality and patient safety, Age-Friendly Health Systems and the future of patient safety, and strategies for transformative change, among other topics. Look for more insights and lessons from these sessions.
Patient safety is and will always be at the core of what we do. If your organization has not yet joined the Patient Safety Initiative, you can sign up here . Participation provides access to free webinars, tools and resources, connection with colleagues across the country, and sharing strategies to support the field’s efforts to improve quality and safety.
Participation also affirms a commitment to ourselves and the patients we serve that hospitals and health systems will continue to strive for…and…deliver excellence as we strive to improve health for all.
