Human factors and patient safety culture

A safety culture is where staff within an organisation have a constant and active awareness of the potential for things to go wrong. Both the staff and the organisation are able to acknowledge mistakes, learn from them, and take action to put things right.

To reduce the likelihood of incidents occurring, patient safety needs to be addressed at an institutional level, ‘from trust board to ward’, as well as by designing out errors in processes and equipment.

The National Reporting and Learning Service (NRLS) encourages healthcare organisations to foster a culture of patient safety and to consider human factors when designing and implementing systems and process.

Resources include:

• Seven steps to patient safety, a series providing detailed guidance on how to improve patient safety locally

• The Manchester Patient Safety Framework (MaPSaF), a tool to help NHS organisations assess their progress in developing a safety culture

Use the box below to search for more resources relating to human factors and safety culture.