Root cause analysis for understanding patient safety incidents in nursing student placements: A qualitative content analysis

Abstract

Aimto explore nursing students’ experiences with the use of RCA technique in patient safety-related incidents during clinical placements. A secondary descriptive qualitative content analysis BackgroundPatient safety education for nursing students is an international priority. While early detection and intervention strategies, such as the root cause analysis technique, have been found to be effective for near misses and errors, little is known about how these strategies facilitate nursing students understand how patient safety incidents happen. DesignA secondary qualitative content analysis was conducted as part of a larger patient safety research project. MethodsData were collected from nursing students at [Hidden for blinding purposes]. This study included 108 third-year undergraduate nursing students enroled in the Care Management in the Socio-Health Care Settings for the academic years 2017–2018 and 2018–2019. During hospital clinical placements, nursing students were asked to do a coursework describing a patient safety incident and using the root cause analysis technique for its analysis. A content analysis was used to provide an in-depth analysis of the collected data. ResultsTwo main themes were identified after the data analysis process: (i) patient safety incident as learning events: highlights how these incidents were turned into learning opportunities and how the root cause analysis guided them in identifying and addressing critical incidents to prevent similar situations in the future; and (ii) strategies for improving patient safety culture: depicts how nursing students realised that following protocols and evidence-based practice reduces incidents related to patient safety and the value of reporting errors in avoiding and minimising the recurrence of similar mistakes. ConclusionsThe root cause analysis technique is a versatile and flexible learning resource for nursing students that can help them understand complex patient safety incidents while also fostering critical and problem-solving thinking, teamwork and systematic communication.