Quality Improvement Project: Evaluation the Impact of daily Safety Huddle on the Frequency of Incidents in Bradgate Mental Health Unit

Abstract

Medical error is one of the leading causes of the death worldwide. Research has shown that safe practice which is influenced by a strong safety culture is the foundation for safe patient care and this culture can be developed and maintained by the implementation of daily safety huddle. This project, therefore, aims to evaluate the effectiveness of safety huddle implementation, as a communication improvement strategy on the frequency of incidents in Bradgate Mental Health Unit. Based on existing work on huddle implementation, it answers the questions: To what extent does a safety huddle implementation reduce the number of incidents in Bradgate Mental Health Unit over a nine-month period? The approach utilized a quantitative pre and post test design for comparison between incidents that happened before huddle implementation and incidents that happened after huddle implementation. The degree of incident reduction was investigated using an interrupted time series analysis using monthly harms data for all the wards where such data was available. Results indicated an overall decrease in the incidents mean in the ward-based huddle indicators although, some indicators did not show a substantial change. At the same time, selected unit-based huddle indicators indicated unexpected increase in the number of incidents. A significant reduction was noted in the number of violence and aggression incidents in Bosworth ward. Thus, the results indicated that the safety huddle has the potential to reduce the frequency of safety incidents. Further research is needed to demonstrate the fidelity of the implementation as well as the barriers and facilitators of the implementation from the point of view of the practitioners.