Risk management

Patients expect safe medical and nursing care. The GPR Clinic has set itself the goal of ensuring the highest possible level of safety for patients and the staff involved in their care.

In 2018, the Joint Federal Committee mandated clinical risk management as a mandatory component of quality management for all hospitals. This involves not only the systematic establishment and further development of a clinical risk management system, but also the appointment of a risk management officer. A large part of the tasks primarily involves risk identification, which entails risk analysis, assessment, mitigation, and evaluation. For risk identification, there are proactive methods, such as audits or risk analyses, and reactive methods, such as reporting systems, case conferences, or complaint management.

Patient safety is at the heart of clinical risk management. For this reason, GPR Klinikum has been a member of the Alliance for Patient Safety (APS) since spring 2019 and implements its recommendations to improve patient safety. We use various methods, tools, and standards to identify, analyze, and prevent risks at an early stage. A high level of safety is ensured through the use of the surgical safety checklist, which accompanies the patient from the ward to the operating room, throughout the procedure, and until its conclusion. Additional measures include, for example, patient identification bracelets and the dual-verification principle for medication administration.

On November 12, 2019, the Patient Safety Ordinance (PaSV) came into effect, which regulates the appointment of a qualified patient safety officer in the hospital. The duties of the patient safety officer include, among other things, the further development of the safety culture in the hospital, the implementation of measures to increase patient safety, the assessment of clinical risks, and the preparation of a report in accordance with § 4 (1) PaSV.

Adverse events are often precursors to a true incident that could result in harm to the patient. The goal of GPR Klinikum is to identify and address potential sources of error in patient care workflows. To enhance patient safety, we use an internal reporting system—the CIRS (Critical Incident Reporting System). Adverse events are reported confidentially, either anonymously or by name. An adverse event is defined as any unintended occurrence that could have harmed a patient. The goal here is not to assign blame, but to initiate, implement, and monitor measures to improve safety and prevent such events in the future. "Learning from mistakes" is the principle that takes top priority here.

Risk management also plays an important role at our senior living facility, "Haus am Ostpark." We identify, analyze, and assess risks and their potential interactions. Through our complaint management system, we also receive information about operational weaknesses, which provides us with valuable insights for continuously improving our services. Likewise, the information we receive through audits, surveys, and our reporting system is incorporated into the risk assessment process. This allows us to identify potential risks when developing a new service or implementing new organizational processes before they are put into practice. This enables us to implement appropriate risk controls. Using this method, we are able to reduce risks by taking measures to prevent them.

Risk management also plays an important role in outpatient care. We identify, analyze, and assess risks and their potential impacts. We obtain key information on these matters from our complaint management system, client visits and care assessments, audits, and our reporting system.

All of this information is incorporated into the risk assessment, enabling us to identify potential risks early on and adjust organizational processes through appropriate measures so that risks can be minimized.