Medicine and Health Sciences Commons^™

Error Or "Act Of God"? A Study Of Patients' And Operating Room Team Members' Perceptions Of Error Definition, Reporting, And Disclosure, Sherry Espin, Wendy Levinson, Glenn Regehr, G. Baker, Lorelei Lingard

Lorelei Lingard

BACKGROUND: Calls abound for a culture change in health care to improve patient safety. However, effective change cannot proceed without a clear understanding of perceptions and beliefs about error. In this study, we describe and compare operative team members' and patients' perceptions of error, reporting of error, and disclosure of error. METHODS: Thirty-nine interviews of team members (9 surgeons, 9 nurses, 10 anesthesiologists) and patients (11) were conducted at 2 teaching hospitals using 4 scenarios as prompts. Transcribed responses to open questions were analyzed by 2 researchers for recurrent themes using the grounded-theory method. Yes/no answers were compared across groups …

Factors Influencing Perioperative Nurses' Error Reporting Preferences, Sherry Espin, Glenn Regehr, Wendy Levinson, G. Baker, Christina Biancucci, Lorelei Lingard

Lorelei Lingard

To explore the influence of scope of practice and patient outcomes on error reporting, 13 nurses were interviewed after they reviewed four "error" scenarios ranging in both scope of practice and seriousness of outcome. Of 52 theoretical incidents, only 30 were identified as errors. The nurses indicated they would formally report errors for only eight of the incidents. For another 10 incidents, the nurses would have reported using an informal reporting system only. Qualitative analysis of the interviews revealed that perceived scope of practice influenced reporting preferences, and seriousness of outcome was only a secondary consideration. Selective error reporting and …

Clinical Oversight: Conceptualizing The Relationship Between Supervision And Safety, Tara Kennedy, Lorelei Lingard, G. Baker, Lisa Kitchen, Glenn Regehr

Lorelei Lingard

BACKGROUND: Concern about the link between clinical supervision and safe, quality health care has led to widespread increases in the supervision of medical trainees. The effects of increased supervision on patient care and trainee education are not known, primarily because the current multifacted and poorly operationalized concept of clinical supervision limits the potential for evaluation.

OBJECTIVE: To develop a conceptual model of clinical supervision to inform and guide policy and research.

DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS: Observational fieldwork and interviews were conducted in the Emergency Department and General Internal Medicine in-patient teaching wards of two academic health sciences centers associated with …

Communication Failures In The Operating Room: An Observational Classification Of Recurrent Types And Effects, Lorelei Lingard, S. Espin, S. Whyte, G. Regehr, G. Baker, R. Reznick, J. Bohnen, B. Orser, D. Doran, E. Grober

Lorelei Lingard

BACKGROUND: Ineffective team communication is frequently at the root of medical error. The objective of this study was to describe the characteristics of communication failures in the operating room (OR) and to classify their effects. This study was part of a larger project to develop a team checklist to improve communication in the OR. METHODS: Trained observers recorded 90 hours of observation during 48 surgical procedures. Ninety four team members participated from anesthesia (16 staff, 6 fellows, 3 residents), surgery (14 staff, 8 fellows, 13 residents, 3 clerks), and nursing (31 staff). Field notes recording procedurally relevant communication events were …

Persistence Of Unsafe Practice In Everyday Work: An Exploration Of Organizational And Psychological Factors Constraining Safety In The Operating Room, S. Espin, Lorelei Lingard, G. Baker, G. Regehr

Lorelei Lingard

This paper explores the factors that influence the persistence of unsafe practice in an interprofessional team setting in health care, towards the development of a descriptive theoretical model for analyzing problematic practice routines. Using data collected during a mixed method interview study of 28 members of an operating room team, participants' approaches to unsafe practice were analyzed using the following three theoretical models from organizational and cognitive psychology: Reason's theory of "vulnerable system syndrome", Tucker and Edmondson's concept of first and second order problem solving, and Amalberti's model of practice migration. These three theoretical approaches provide a critical insight into …