Free State Province sets strategy on patient safety

The Free State Province is determined to improve clinical governance and patient safety at its health institutions through a formal strategy and the establishment of feasible monitoring and evaluation structures.

 

Many of these were explored at a two-day workshop attended by about 400 delegates on patient safety held at the Philip Sanders Resort and Conference Centre near Bloemfontein at the end of September. The international perspectives of this important subject (1 in 10 patients admitted to a hospital usually suffers an adverse event, i.e. harm caused by the medical profession) were supplied by Dr Itziar Larizgoita, Coordinator of Research and Knowledge Management for the patient safety programme at the World Health Organisation.

 

Prominent local speakers included the late MEC for Health in the Free State, Me Fezi Ngubentombi, Professor Stuart Whittaker from COHSASA speaking on clinical governance as it relates to patient safety, Dr Sipho Kabane, HOD of the Free State Health Department who delivered a presentation on the outcomes of the Free State patient safety study and Professor Anthony Linegar (research consultant to COHSASA) who delivered a presentation on the impact of patient safety research on clinical decision making.

 

Dr Leshata Ratlabyane, Manager of Clinical Services for Mediclinic Southern Africa, provided perspectives of a clinical governance programme from the private sector point of view.

 

A highlight of the programme was that it became abundantly clear that the AIMS programme has taken firm root in the Free State and is an integral part of the province’s strategy to improve patient safety and quality.

 

Mr Sibusiso Zuma, the Director of Clinical Quality and Compliance at Department of Health in the Free State, who with a team was responsible for putting the workshop together, said, “patient safety is everybody’s business.”