Brussels, 19/06/2014 (Agence Europe) - More effort is required on patient safety in the EU according to several documents published on Thursday 19 June by the European Commission. These documents note the progress made since 2012 and highlight barriers to overcome to improve the situation. While significant progress has been made in terms of shaping national programmes for patient safety and putting in place systems for patients to report adverse effects, there is a still a long way to go in terms of implementing provisions on patient empowerment and in particular on education and training of healthcare workers. The documents will feed into the reflection process currently underway on future EU-level action on patient safety and quality of care. Tonio Borg, European Commissioner for Health, said: “When our citizens go to a hospital, they expect safe healthcare… Most member states now have patient safety programmes in place… Despite such progress, there are still adverse events in healthcare settings and patient safety is seldom part of healthcare workers training. We therefore need to pursue efforts to ensure greater safety for our citizens in healthcare settings”.
The documents published are:
1. The Report on the Implementation of the 2009 Council Recommendation on Patient Safety. Following the 2012 report, which demonstrated progress by member states and identified areas requiring further efforts, the report points to further progress over the last two years, notably in the following areas: 1) policies and programmes on patient safety, 2) reporting adverse events, and learning from errors and 3) empowering patients. When it comes to the impact of the Recommendation, 21 out of the 28 reporting countries said that it increased awareness at political level, 20 said that it increased awareness in healthcare settings and 16 said that it triggered concrete action. However, the report concludes that there is a need for continuous efforts at EU level to increase patient safety and quality of care, and proposes a list of measures.
2. The Eurobarometer survey on patient safety and quality of care, conducted between November and December 2013 in all 28 EU countries, shows that: 1) just over half of EU citizens think it is likely patients could be harmed by hospital care in their county; 2) just over one quarter said that they or a family member have experienced an adverse event while receiving healthcare; 3) of these people, 46% reported the adverse events in 2013 compared with only 28% in 2009; 4) in 37% of cases where adverse events were reported “nothing happened”. However, one in five received an apology from the doctor or nurse, while 17% were given an explanation for the error by the healthcare facility.
3. The Results of the Public Consultation that ran between December 2013 and February 2014. This shows that civil society still sees patient safety as an issue in the EU. According to the respondents, the most effective measures are involving health professionals, binding national laws, involvement of patient organisations and EU cooperation on patient safety. (IL)