HA releases Risk Management Publications
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The Hospital Authority (HA) today (January 19) published both the latest quarterly issue of "HA Risk Alert" and the Annual Report on Sentinel and Serious Untoward Events as a risk management and communication initiative to further strengthen incident reporting and the sharing of lessons learnt for safety improvements in public hospitals.
The HA spokesman said that the current issue of "HA Risk Alert" reported two cases of retained consumables or instruments, three cases of patient suicide and an incident of gas embolism. Furthermore, among the 16 reported Serious Untoward Events, there were 15 medication errors and a case of patient misidentification.
"Subsequent to incident review and analysis of root causes of these incidents, important lessons of patient safety are identified, while recommendations are made and shared in this publication to avoid similar events in future," the spokesman added.
In a similar development, the HA also released the Annual Report on Sentinel and Serious Untoward Events covering the 12 months from October 1, 2015 to September 30, 2016 after it was discussed and endorsed by the HA Board this afternoon. In this year's report, a total of 32 Sentinel Events were reported, as compared to 39 in the last reporting period.
During the year, 86 Serious Untoward Events were also reported, with 73 and 13 events related to medication error and patient misidentification respectively. Serious Untoward Events are unexpected occurrences which did not cause death or permanent harm to patients but would have the potential to do so if not for timely intervention.
The Annual Report on Sentinel and Serious Untoward Events can be accessed by health care workers and the public at www.ha.org.hk/report/sentinel_event, while the “HA Risk Alert” has been distributed to healthcare professionals in public hospitals for continuous quality improvement purposes and can be accessed by the public at www.ha.org.hk/riskalert. The next issue will be published on April 28, 2017.
Ends/Thursday, January 19, 2017
Issued at HKT 17:16
Issued at HKT 17:16
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