Improving Patient Safety Training - Research Paper Example

Improving Patient Safety Training Introduction Among various forms of professions, health care is regarded as being unique when compared to the rest of the professions. This because of its relationship existing between the educational program and the training of health care professionals as well as the delivery of care services to the patients. Many hospitals and clinics that deliver health care service to the patients globally depend solely on the medical trainees in the deliverance of the major portion of healthcare services to the patients. These medical trainees act like a big source of working population in most hospitals. The linking of the educational system being used in the training of medical trainees to the health care delivery services to the patients has for long created a system that is tightly coupled. In this system when error occurs or is made in one part of the system, the other system is automatically compromised and put at risk. In the process of learning, several errors are made as the learner tries to make his development as well as refine his or her professional role. During my internship program, I realized that in health care, more so in most of the teaching hospitals where the medical trainees do deliver a huge percentage of the health care services, training does not take place in a controlled environment where risk is minimized like other professionals that entail error critical situations. From this point, I understood that the system of education being often used and occasionally do present what can be said to be “latent hazard” within the system of healthcare. The concept that is being used in most hospitals where patients are being used by the trainees in the process of practicing essential skills presents a great patient safety risk during the process of clinical practices. The process of trying to maintain clinical competence or to lack the competence is another aspect of risk presented to the safety of patients. When a medical practitioner is said to be competent whatever the level, there is always no assurance that, the medical practitioner’s level of competence will remain intact for a long time. When new procedures and practices are introduced in the hospitals, the experienced medical practitioner is considered potentially dangerous to the patient just as the new medical trainee. Some people argue that the trained practitioners pose a greater risk to patient's safety because they practice without being under supervision. Unfortunately, many people have always been seeing training and education as the only means through which patient safety problems can be corrected. Good training system when applied improperly as an intervention can make matters even worse by not addressing some of the contributing factors in the chain of events that consequently leads up to events that are adverse. The challenge in the safety of patients is critically examining the role of training and education as a potential hazard in the healthcare system as an intervention. The ADDIE method Analysis The first step in phase of analysis is trying to identify the target audience for the training instruction. I identified that different groups of learners do have different needs that are based on several roles and functions that are different that they are expected to perform. During this phase, several methods will be used, and they include task analysis of the job functions, groups that are focused, surveys and the development of requirements and needs that are in consensus. In addition to this, for the job functions, the use of task analysis will be used as an approach that may be desired according to the needs assessment. Opportunities will be opened for individuals to select experts when dealing with the emerging, as well as the new roles that deals with the safety of patients such as patient safety officer. Development The developments will involve the learning outcomes and the objectives of the performance for the instructional activities. Through development of behavioral objectives, there will be an extensive guidance given out to and made available for this element of instruction that is seen to be essential. There will be the existence of objectives that are well formulated so that it can help in guiding those individuals who will be managing the process of instruction as well as the learners who will be ready to receive training on patient safety and management. The learners who will be highly motivated will be given the objectives of the instructions so that they will be able to succeed despite their faculties of teachers. It is in this stage that individuals will try to identify their entry-level skills and behaviors. The stage will also be used to help in specifying all the sequences and structures of the instructions that will be expected to be followed and carried out. Design This phase will involve the learners taking specifications from the development and analysis phases to help in designing instructions. The design will involve specifying all the activities and events of learning as well as developing management instructions and system of instruction delivery. Individuals will start mapping the learning needs and the requirements with the right experiences in learning and stimuli that will lead to an outcome that is desired. In this phase, we will use through conceptualization of learning stimuli to be represented by a cone of experience that will be ranging from experience that will be direct purposeful through the abstract visual and verbal symbols. The base of the cone consists of the direct experience; the next level consists of experiences that are contrived like simulations. Ascending the cone, there is movement from the involvement of the learner directly to a situation where the learner starts becoming a passive observant and experiences such as learning stimuli that are mediated. The top of the cone has verbal symbols; some printed words will present this. The task of the instructional designer during the training will be matching the requirements of learning with the most appropriate learning stimuli that will be available. In the education and training in health care, many experiences individuals are heavily dependent on direct experiences. This is dangerous since it puts the patients in potential dangers of risk of harm and injuries. At the other end, using the same spectrum, we are going to rely more on the verbal symbols or printed texts. This will be used in providing stimulus of learning in case there will be a requirement of either visual or mediated stimuli. It will be fortunate to have a wide variety of instructional media during the training process from which to make choices from. In selecting the best media to use during the training, process will depend with the attributes of the media to convey the message in a unique form and manner. In the process, we will be completing a prototype testing. There will be two types of prototype testing, and testing used will be extensive in the early stages but will include a larger sample during the stages of prototype. Implementation The implementation phase is going to involve the instructional management plan and conducting things dealing with the instructions. The use and deployment of the instructions will be carefully planned according to what will happen during the design and development phases. Instructional gatekeepers will be employed to help in serving as providers of the learners’ access. The gatekeepers will be training managers and teachers. Someone will be placed in virtually to serve the position that is critical in the learning process. The implementation strategy will include a strategy that will be aiming at involving the instructional gatekeepers so that the intended audience can be reached in large numbers. During the process, there will be a need to have special in-service for faculty or teachers development sessions. The learning environment is critical in the process; therefore, a thorough assessment of the learning environment in which the learning instructions is to take place is well. The facilitators will also ensure that all the needed resources that will be used during the instructional program are available. Evaluation This phase will start right from pretesting of prototype that will be described. The steps of evaluation that will be conducted will be the initial formative evaluations to be used for the instructional program. During the process of training, internal evaluation will be conducted before the program is distributed. A large external evaluation of the program will be done in order to have a complete review and objective of how the program will be effective. Most of the evaluation that will be conducted during and after the program will be based upon the assessment of the outcome of learning basing it on learners as individuals. Improving patient safety Training QUIZ DATE: NAME OF TRAINER: EMPLOYE NAME(PRINT) SHIFT EMPLOYEE SIGNATURE DEPARTMENT 1) The purpose of the patient safety is to make sure that needed information reaches all employees and workers who put the safety of patients at risk? TRUE FALSE 2) which type of risks does health care professionals put the patients at most? A. Health B. Trauma and injuries C. Death 3) Where does the health care professional document their work in hospitals? 4) Measures in patient safety should be trained in all medical professionals irrespective of experiences? A. True B. False 5) Before performing the procedure, an individual should? A. Check to see if he or she has all materials ready. B. Have someone beside to correct if the procedure is done wrongly C. Do it alone. D. All the above. 6) Is it risky to perform a procedure alone? TRUE FALSE 7) Do experience medical professionals also put the patient's lives at risk? TRUE FALSE 13) Patient safety risk can be classified as? A. potential B. normal C. life threatening 14) Is It hard to avoid putting the patient lives at risk during clinical practice? A. True B. False 15) Immediate and thorough clinical teaching and trainings are needed across all careers of health care professionals to reduce the risks on patients’ lives. A. True B. False Works cited Battles J B, Kirk L M, Dowell D L. et al The health sciences communicator as faculty developer. J Biocommun 1989. 162– 168. Read More