What would you do if you were concerned someone at work was about to make an error, or was in the process of making one, that might adversely impact a patient?
Or if you saw a colleague behaving inappropriately, in a way that put a person’s safety at risk? Would you say something, or would you remain silent?
Nurses and midwives have a long history of speaking up when they see something going wrong or when they suspect a patient is at risk of harm.
Having the ability to ‘speak up’ - and feeling safe to do so - is crucial to the provision of safe, quality and effective care.
This module discusses speaking up as part of daily practice. Whilst speaking up, open disclosure and whistle blowing share some elements, they are all different. This module is about saying something BEFORE something goes wrong.
We discuss why speaking up is critical to patient safety, individual responsibilities as a health practitioner, and the potential barriers to speaking up. We then go on to explore some strategies that may be used to assist in speaking up.
At the end of this module participants will be able to:
