to the veteran circulating
nurse, must be comfortable
speaking up and speaking
out if they see something
amiss at any point during
patient care. Reward mem-
bers who alert you to safety
concerns, acknowledge their
concerns and take immediate corrective action if it's warranted.
Measure perceptions
It's difficult to quantify an abstract concept like safety culture, but
there are tools available to measure your staff's attitudes toward how
effectively they work together and how much safety is emphasized with-
in your facility. For example, the Safety Attitudes Questionnaire gauges
your staff's perceptions of teamwork climate, job satisfaction, percep-
tions of management, safety climate, working conditions and stress
recognition (osmag.net/6eZyAV). Using the questionnaire to evaluate
your safety culture provides a framework for discussions about how it
can be improved.
Discuss mistakes
Ask your staff hard questions: How will the next patient be
harmed? What specific steps can they take to prevent that harm from
happening? A positive safety culture is one where your staff and sur-
geons feel comfortable sharing events that led up to surgical errors,
so that everyone can learn from them. That sharing can be done
through formal meetings or informal group discussions. How you dis-
cuss patient safety is not as important as ensuring there's a system in
4
3
On Point
OP
6 • O U T PA T I E N T S U R G E R Y M A G A Z I N E • O C T O B E R 2 0 1 8
One person's attitude
is an opinion.
Everybody's attitude
is culture.
