Event reporting: the value of a nonpunitive approach

Abstract

This article will discuss why patient safety has been so hard to achieve due to long standing beliefs that when errors occur individuals must be blamed or punished. It will offer suggestions as to how a culture of learning can be advanced by fostering a different approach to medical errors and how reporting systems and an analytic process that always identifies root causes of problems can help physicians reduce harm to patients and ultimately malpractice risk.