Measuring Patient Safety Culture in a UK NHS Hospital with an American Assessment Tool

Abstract

The need to assess patient safety culture has been recommended by the National Patient Safety Agency and the Department of Health as part of an initiative aimed at delivering safer patient care. Safety culture assessments are a new venture for the NHS and knowledge on applicable tools is slowly emerging. This paper presents the use of a US patient safety culture assessment tool in the UK and a survey of patient safety culture at University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust. This tool can reveal shared attitudes and perceptions on patient safety climate, elicit underlying safety culture and identify areas for further patient safety culture assessments using other tools. The survey showed that the best patient safety dimension across the Trust was teamwork within wards/departments. The lowest performing dimension was hospital handovers and transitions.