Patient Safety
Building upon our core values of integrity, compassion, excellence, respect and innovation, Southern Health-Santé Sud’s Board of Directors is committed to fostering and supporting a culture of quality and safety within the region. With our quality framework, we purposefully measure and monitor performance on standards and best practices for safe, quality care and service delivery with meaningful reporting and valid information. We also seek opportunities to relate and engage with all health care providers and partners in exploring improved ways of providing sustainable, safe and integrated client centred health care. We support a learning environment that promotes innovation and the development of quality improvement competency, skills and processes in the region.
The outcome of this commitment is to provide you with quality care, transparency, and a greater awareness of patient safety and quality you deserve.
It’s Safe to Ask
Southern Health-Santé Sud encourages families to request the information they need in order to become active participants in their care. Please don’t hesitate to ask your health care provider questions when things are unclear or if you question a possible critical incident. Knowledge is critical to quality health care and improved health outcomes.
Critical Incidents
When people receive health care services, they expect to receive safe care. Health care providers try to do their best to ensure this is the case. But unexpected things can happen to patients that cause them unintended harm. When this event happens, it is called a critical incident.
What is a critical incident?
A critical incident is an unintended event that occurs when health services are provided to an individual and result in harm:
- serious and undesired, such as death, disability, injury or harm, unplanned admission to hospital or unusual extension of a hospital stay; and
- not a result from the individual’s underlying health condition or from a risk inherent in providing the heath services. This means the unintended event does not result from the patient’s illness or the risk in treating the illness, but from the health care provided.
What is disclosure and how are critical incidents reported?
When health care providers discuss the facts about a critical incident with the patient, this process is called disclosure. While we are sorry that a critical incident has occurred, we want to provide you with an explanation of what has happened – this fosters an environment of openness, trust and transparency in our health care system.
To report any concerns about the care you received, please submit your feedback through our Compliments and Concerns form.