Structural Approaches to Address Issues in Patient Safety

Since the publication of the report “To Err Is Human: Building a Safer Health System” by the US Institute of Medicine in 2000, much has changed with regard to patient safety. Many of the more recent initiatives to improve patient safety target the behavior of health care staff (e.g., training, double-checking procedures, and standard operating procedures). System-based interventions have so far received less attention, even though they produce more substantial improvements, being less dependent on individuals’ behavior. One type of system-based intervention that can benefit patient safety involves improvements to hospital design. Given that people’s working environments affect their behavior, good design at a systemic level not only enables staff to work more efficiently; it can also prevent errors and mishaps, which can have serious consequences for patients. While an increasing number of studies have demonstrated the effect of hospital design on patient safety, this knowledge is not easily accessible to Structural Approaches to Address Issues in Patient Safety Advances in Health Care Management, Volume 18, 1 17 Copyright r 2019 by Emerald Publishing Limited All rights of reproduction in any form reserved ISSN: 1474-8231/doi:10.1108/S1474-823120190000018001