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Surgical residents' perceptions of patient safety climate in D utch teaching hospitals
Author(s) -
Martowirono Kartinie,
Wagner Cordula,
Bijnen A. Bart
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
journal of evaluation in clinical practice
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.737
H-Index - 73
eISSN - 1365-2753
pISSN - 1356-1294
DOI - 10.1111/jep.12096
Subject(s) - patient safety , medicine , internal consistency , safety climate , occupational safety and health , family medicine , nursing , health care , patient satisfaction , pathology , economics , economic growth
Rationale, aims and objectives Explicit attention to patient safety during surgical training is needed to improve patient safety. A positive safety climate is associated with greater patient safety and is a requisite for safety teaching at the workplace. The S afety C limate S urvey ( SCS ) measures perceptions of safety climate. This study aims to take a first step in validating the SCS for use among surgical residents in the N etherlands and to highlight opportunities for safety climate improvement through changes in surgical training in the N etherlands. It therefore assesses (1) if the SCS can be used to assess surgical residents' perceptions of the safety climate in D utch teaching hospitals; and (2) how, according to SCS results, these residents perceive the safety climate in D utch teaching hospitals. Methods In a cross‐sectional study conducted in F ebruary 2011, a D utch translation of the SCS was administered to all general surgical residents in the N etherlands. Face validity and internal consistency were assessed, as were overall mean, means per item and significant differences in means between different groups of respondents. Results In total, 306 of 390 (78%) residents completed the questionnaire. The SCS showed good face validity and internal consistency ( C ronbach's alpha = 0.87). Residents reported an overall mean of 3.95 (standard deviation 0.51) out of a maximum score of 5.00, and 52% reported an overall mean of 4.00 or higher. Women and residents working in university hospitals gave significantly lower scores. Significant differences were also found among hospitals and among regions. Majority of the items scored less than 4.00. Conclusions The SCS is potentially useful to measure surgical residents' perceptions of the patient safety climate in D utch teaching hospitals. There is considerable room for improvement of the patient safety climate. Surgical training should include better feedback, formal patient safety teaching sessions at the workplace and specific attention to patient safety during the introduction in a new hospital, and supervisors should encourage surgical residents to report any patient safety concern they may have.