What is Incident Reporting in Healthcare?
The term incident reporting in healthcare refers to the processes developed to report or escalate an incident that affects patients, members of the workforce, and/or the organization at which the incident occurs. Effective incident reporting in healthcare can enhance patient safety, workplace safety, and regulatory compliance, and provide insights into how to mitigate the likelihood of future incidents.
There are many types of “incidents” that can occur in healthcare. For example, patients can suffer adverse events due to medication errors, members of the workforce can be injured due to slips, trips, or falls, and organizations can experience cyberattacks that affect their ability to function effectively. When these incidents occur, the processes developed to report or escalate incidents can determine how quickly they are resolved and what the consequences are.
What is an Incident Report in Healthcare?
In its simplest form, an incident report in healthcare is a report of an error, accident, or other event that occurred in a healthcare facility. Non-emergency reports are usually made by the workforce member who witnessed or experienced the event – or to whom it was notified – and then escalated to the individual(s) or department(s) responsible for resolving the event. Emergency processes for incident reporting in healthcare vary depending on the nature of the emergency.
The report and any subsequent documentation can be reviewed in isolation or combined with reports of similar incidents to gain insights into the root cause of errors, accidents, or other events. This can help healthcare organizations develop strategies to mitigate the likelihood of common incidents being repeated, or adjust existing strategies to improve patient and workforce safety – or improve the security of the organization and the data it maintains.
Different Types of Incident Reporting in Healthcare
A healthcare organization can have different reporting processes for different types of incident. For example, written reports may be appropriate for incidents that do not require an immediate resolution or that have minimal consequences. However, a verbal or real-time electronic process may be necessary to effectively resolve a patient safety issue, attend to a serious workforce member’s injury, or mitigate the impact of an ongoing cybersecurity event.
In some cases, an incident report in healthcare may have to be made via a supervisor or department manager. Alternatively, workforce members may be authorized to escalate an incident report directly to the responsible individual(s) or department(s) depending on the nature of the event. Because of the different types of incident reporting in healthcare, it is important workforce members receive training on which processes apply to which types of event.
Examples of Incident Reports in Healthcare
In addition to the examples of incident reports in healthcare provided in the introduction to this article, organizations should develop incident reporting processes for when a patient:
- Sustains an on-site injury while unsupervised.
- Is misidentified or is the victim of wrong site surgery.
- Is hurt in an accident attributable to poor housekeeping.
- Complains of bedsores or a healthcare-related infection.
- Attacks a member of the workforce, visitor, or another patient.
- Raises concerns that their HIPAA privacy rights have been violated.
Other examples of incident reports in healthcare include when a member of the workforce sustains a lifting injury or is the victim of workplace violence, and when a manmade (i.e., active shooter) or natural disaster (i.e., extreme weather event) impacts operational effectiveness. While it might not be possible to mitigate the likelihood of all incidents being repeated, an analysis of incident reports in healthcare can help mitigate the consequences of incidents.
Importance of Incident Reporting in Healthcare
The importance of incident reporting in healthcare is that it enables organizations to understand what happened, how it happened, and how it can be prevented – or the consequences mitigated in the future. Incident reporting also promotes accountability, transparency, and compliance inasmuch as if an incident is attributable to non-compliance with a federal or state regulation, the cause of the non-compliance can be identified and addressed.
Most importantly, incident reporting in healthcare contributes to better patient safety. Processes can be adopted – or fine-tuned – to prevent events such as medication errors, patient misidentifications, and wrong site surgeries; and although more incident reporting in healthcare implies more errors, accidents, and adverse events, the more reports an organization receives, the more it can analyze the data to identify trends that require targeted interventions.
Incident Reporting Systems in Healthcare
While paper reports, phone trees, and emails may have a place in incident reporting, the most effective way to meet reporting requirements is with incident reporting systems. Often, incident reporting systems in healthcare can be configured to support every type of incident and automatically escalate incident reports to the responsible individual(s) or department(s) once the report has been entered into the system by a workforce member.
Incident reporting systems in healthcare have the benefits of ensuring reports are received and acted upon, that paper files are not mislaid, and that emails or phone calls are not ignored. They also have the benefit of reducing the number of reporting processes members of the workforce have to remember. Healthcare organizations concerned that their existing incident reporting processes may leave room for errors and oversights are advised to speak with an incident reporting system vendor.
