Abstract

Hospital leaders have been directed to focus on assuring patient safety and improving outcomes through the development of a strong safety culture. The Safety Attitude Questionnaire (SAQ) at a small rural hospital showed a decline, over three years, in the perceived safety climate of the organization, by clinical staff. The purpose of this quality improvement project was the implementation of a structured debriefing program, promoting teamwork and collaboration between leadership and front-line staff, to improve the safety culture of the organization, exhibited by an improvement in SAQ scores within one year. Leading safety researchers suggest that developing a culture of safety has not been a priority due to the required time and resource allocation. Shifting organizational priorities eliminated the focus on this project's development and eliminated the opportunity to reassess staff perceptions of the safety climate by discontinuation of the SAQ. A project wrap up meeting revealed the benefits of the debriefing sessions and reinforced the opportunity for continued promotion of a culture of safety. There was consensus amongst the leadership that education, at all levels, was needed to define a culture of safety and create awareness of the importance of teamwork and collaboration.

Author Details

Jessica Gruendler, DNP, RN-BC, CNOR

Sigma Membership

Non-member

Type

DNP Capstone Project

Format Type

Text-based Document

Study Design/Type

Other

Research Approach

Other

Keywords:

Teamwork, Culture of Safety, Collaboration, Safety of Patients

Advisor

JoAnn Manty

Second Advisor

Kimberly Sniffen

Third Advisor

Colleen Avery

Degree

DNP

Degree Grantor

Capella University

Degree Year

2015

Rights Holder

All rights reserved by the author(s) and/or publisher(s) listed in this item record unless relinquished in whole or part by a rights notation or a Creative Commons License present in this item record.

All permission requests should be directed accordingly and not to the Sigma Repository.

All submitting authors or publishers have affirmed that when using material in their work where they do not own copyright, they have obtained permission of the copyright holder prior to submission and the rights holder has been acknowledged as necessary.

Review Type

None: Degree-based Submission

Acquisition

Self-submission

Date of Issue

2015-10-09

Full Text of Presentation

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