Abstract
The aim of this study was to identify methodologies to evaluate incidents in primary health care, types of incidents, contributing factors, and solutions to make primary care safer. A systematic literature review was performed in the following databases: PubMed, Scopus, LILACS, SciELO, and Capes, from 2007 to 2012, in Portuguese, English, and Spanish. Thirty-three articles were selected: 26% on retrospective studies, 44% on prospective studies, including focus groups, questionnaires, and interviews, and 30% on cross-sectional studies. The most frequently used method was incident analysis from incident reporting systems (45%). The most frequent types of incidents in primary care were related to medication and diagnosis. The most relevant contributing factors were communication failures among member of the healthcare team. Research methods on patient safety in primary care are adequate and replicable, and they will likely be used more widely, thereby providing better knowledge on safety in this setting.
Highlights
The report by the U.S Institute of Medicine entitled To Err is Human: Building a Safer Health System 1 defined patient safety as a central issue on the agendas of many countries
The publication was a milestone for patient safety and issued an alert against errors in health care and harm to patients
The International Classification for Patient Safety was developed, in which incident is defined as any event or circumstance that could have resulted or did result in unnecessary harm to the patient 2
Summary
The publication was a milestone for patient safety and issued an alert against errors in health care and harm to patients. The International Classification for Patient Safety was developed, in which incident is defined as any event or circumstance that could have resulted or did result in unnecessary harm to the patient 2. The current study defines adverse event as an incident that results in harm to the patient 3, while contributing factors are circumstances, actions, or influences that are believed to have played a role in the origin or development of an incident, or that increase the risk of an incident occurring 3. As defined in this study, incident types involve the origin: due to medication; lack, delay, or error in diagnosis; or treatment or procedure not related to medication 4. In 2006, the European Committee on Patient Safety acknowledged the need to consider patient safety as a dimension of health quality at all levels of care, from health promotion to treatment of the disease 5
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
