News: 27 healthcare stakeholders call for adopting three resources to improve patient care

At the Institute for Healthcare Improvement Patient Safety Congress in Dallas in mid-May, the 27 members of the National Steering Committee for Patient Safety (NSC) issued the Declaration to Advance Patient Safety. The NSC features healthcare organizations and healthcare systems; patients, families, and care partners; professional societies; safety and quality organizations; regulatory and accrediting bodies; and federal agencies, such as the CMS and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The Declaration to Advance Patient Safety, according to HealthLeaders, calls on healthcare leaders to:

• Review and implement the 17 recommendations presented in Safer Together: A National Action Plan to Advance Patient Safety, which is organized into four foundational areas:
  
  • Culture, leadership, and governance
  • Patient and family engagement
  • Workforce safety
  • Learning systems
• Identify a senior sponsor and team to use the National Action Plan's Self-Assessment Tool, which helps healthcare organizations determine where to start in improving patient safety
• Use the National Action Plan's Implementation Resource Guide to bolster and sustain efforts to enact the four foundational areas identified in the National Action Plan

"We focused on issuing a declaration to call attention to the important work that we felt was necessary because we were concerned that the coronavirus pandemic had been diverting attention away from safety," Patricia McGaffigan, RN, vice president of the Institute for Healthcare Improvement and IHI senior sponsor for the NSC, told HealthLeaders. “We also wanted to focus on the ongoing foundational work that is necessary for strong safety performance in healthcare organizations.”

Editor’s note: To read HealthLeaders’ conversation with McGaffigan, click here.