By 2027, 40% Deployment Rate of Dedicated Patient Safety Personnel and Expansion of Patient Safety Surveys (Comprehensive)

The government is preparing a plan to assign dedicated patient safety personnel to small and medium-sized hospital-level medical institutions to prevent patient safety accidents. In addition, it has decided to expand the patient safety survey to understand the social and economic costs caused by patient safety accidents.

On the 14th, the Ministry of Health and Welfare reviewed, resolved, and finalized the 2nd Comprehensive Patient Safety Plan (2023?2027) at the 14th National Patient Safety Committee meeting, which includes these contents. The Comprehensive Patient Safety Plan is established every five years according to the Patient Safety Act enacted in 2015, following the death of the late Jeong Jong-hyun, who was 9 years old at the time in 2010, due to a chemotherapy drug administration error at a hospital. The 1st Comprehensive Plan focused on building basic infrastructure such as collecting patient safety accident information, establishing central and regional patient safety centers, and assigning dedicated personnel within medical institutions.

A Ministry of Health and Welfare official stated, “This 2nd Comprehensive Plan focuses on strengthening the existing infrastructure and spreading a patient safety culture.”

The Ministry plans to significantly increase the staffing of healthcare institutions to prevent patient safety accidents occurring in hospitals. Currently, medical institutions of a certain scale, such as hospital-level institutions with 200 or more beds and general hospitals with 100 or more beds, are required to have dedicated patient safety personnel. The plan is to enable small and medium-sized medical institutions that do not meet this criterion to also assign related personnel. In addition, through the establishment of committees and provision of incentives to expand patient safety infrastructure in small and medium-sized medical institutions, the goal is to raise the proportion of dedicated patient safety personnel from 25% as of last year to over 40%.

The size and number of regional patient safety centers will also be increased. A patient safety management guideline for frequent accidents will be developed by institutionalizing patient safety executive education programs. When there is a concern about a serious risk to patient safety, a ‘caution alert’ is issued to medical institutions, and the plan includes strengthening the patient safety reporting and learning system through case analysis of these alerts.

The Ministry also announced plans to expand the patient safety survey through this 2nd Comprehensive Plan. To collect more empirical data on patient safety accidents, the number of surveyed medical institutions will increase from 15 in the previous year to 75 by 2027. Since patient safety accidents are directly linked to human casualties and cause significant social and economic losses, a detailed survey is necessary.

National-level support systems will also be expanded. To secure the foundation, the role of the Central Patient Safety Center will be expanded, and the capabilities of the national patient safety control tower will be strengthened by securing essential personnel for building a national medical safety network. For integration of patient safety-related data, information systems of related organizations will be linked, and a patient safety research and development (R&D) integrated management system overseeing the safety of medical technologies will be established.

The comprehensive plan also includes a vision to raise public interest to spread a patient safety culture. To this end, patient safety activity participation programs will be developed, and in building patient safety management systems, not only the government and local governments but also patient-related organizations and groups will be allowed to participate.

Park Min-su, the 2nd Vice Minister of the Ministry of Health and Welfare, stated, “We will faithfully implement key tasks for accident prevention, such as activating public participation in patient safety activities, strengthening the capabilities of healthcare institutions to reduce patient safety accidents on the ground, and expanding national-level support systems.” He added, “Considering changes in the healthcare environment and public demand, we will establish annual implementation plans and enhance the execution and effectiveness of the comprehensive plan through performance reviews.”