(ANSA) – ROME, SEPTEMBER 17 – Missed, incorrect or delayed diagnoses. Errors of this type represent 16% of preventable harm to patients and are common in all healthcare settings. This is the theme at the center of the Patient Safety Day, promoted on September 17 by the World Health Organization, as an opportunity to raise public awareness and promote collaboration between patients, healthcare professionals and policy makers.
A diagnosis identifies a patient’s health problem and is the key to accessing the care and treatment they need. A diagnostic error is the failure to establish a correct and timely explanation for a patient’s health problem and can include delayed, incorrect or missed diagnoses, as well as the failure to communicate that explanation to the patient. The theme of World Patient Safety Day 2024 is “Improving diagnosis for patient safety” with the slogan “Do it right, make it safe!”, which highlights the critical importance of correct and timely diagnosis to ensure patient safety. Tonight, many monuments and institutional buildings will be lit up in orange to mark the occasion, and WHO will light up the iconic Jet d’Eau in Geneva, the headquarters of the organization.
Diagnostic safety, WHO emphasizes, “can be significantly improved by addressing the systems-based issues and cognitive factors that can lead to errors.” Systemic factors are organizational vulnerabilities including communication failures between health workers or health workers and patients, heavy workloads, and ineffective teamwork. Cognitive factors include the doctor’s training and experience, as well as predisposition to bias, fatigue, and stress. (ANSA).
2024-09-18 04:32:31