Establishing a Common Taxonomy for Patient Safety Reporting
Overcoming Inconsistent Definitions of Errors and Unreliable Reporting
The various approaches used in healthcare to define and classify near misses, adverse events, and other patient safety concepts have generally been fragmented. The definition of an error or mistake is inconsistent, and the reliability of reporting is also a concern.
Having access to standardized data would make it easier to file patient safety reports and conduct root cause analyses in a consistent fashion. The Joint Commission on Accreditation of Health Care Organizations (JCAHO) developed a Patient Safety Event Taxonomy that was tested in this study.
Aggregating data into a standardized taxonomy was successful used by epidemiologists to detect nosocomial infections and also to establish patterns and trends in patient safety. Click "Download Whitepaper" to request the URL to this resource.
