New National Action Plan Released to Advance Patient Safety

The National Steering Committee (NSC) for Patient Safety has released a National Action Plan intended to provide health systems with renewed momentum and clearer direction for eliminating preventable medical harm. Safer Together: A National Action Plan to Advance Patient Safety draws from evidence-based practices, widely known and effective interventions, exemplar case examples, and newer innovations.

The Action Plan calls on health systems to make improving patient safety an organizational priority by engaging “patients, families, and care partners in the co-production of care. Healthcare leaders and healthcare professionals need to fully engage with patients, families, and care partners in ongoing co-design and co-production of their care” and to involve “patients as equal partners in the diagnostic process and in decisions about their care using evidence-based patient decision aids and reporting tools for patient-reported outcomes.”

The NSC is made up of 27 influential federal agencies, safety organizations and experts, and patient and family advocates, first brought together in 2018 by the Institute for Healthcare Improvement. Of these members, several Coalition to Improve Diagnosis in Medicine members were represented in the Steering Committee, including the Society to Improve Diagnosis in Medicine.

“The way in which diverse groups and patient advocates who are interested in patient safety came together to forge the National Action Plan is unprecedented, and it underscores the necessity to work together to create the safest health care possible,” said NSC Co-Chair Jeffrey Brady, MD, MPH, who directs the Center for Quality Improvement and Patient Safety at the U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. “Over the past 20 years, the field has amassed a tremendous body of knowledge to improve healthcare safety. What’s been missing is the use of this knowledge for more coordinated action. That’s what we want to rectify.”

For more information on the National Action Plan to Advance Patient Safety, click here.