Dr. Minu Bajpai, the Executive Director of National Board of Examinations in Medical Sciences, said the task of ensuring patient safety becomes much harder as the country’s health sector is poised to increase exponentially in the coming years and the gap between the demand and supply of specialists could not be easily filled. Healthcare administrators should work together towards the optimum patient safety, he suggested.
Participating as the chief guest in the inaugural session of a National Conference on Patient Safety organised at the AIIMS-Mangalagiri here on the occasion of World Patient Safety Day on Sunday, Dr. Bajpai said as the healthcare systems expand and become much more complex, the possibility of patient harm increases, calling for strict patient-safety environment.
To ensure the successful implementation of patient safety strategies, clear policies, capacity building, data required to drive safety improvements, skilled health care professionals and a larger involvement of patients were needed, he observed, while highlighting the importance of patient feedback.
D.K. Sharma, Medical Superintendent of Dr. Rajendra Prasad Centre for Ophthalmic Sciences at AIIMS-New Delhi said patient safety was a prerequisite for strengthening health care systems and making progress towards universal health coverage.
Remotely addressing the gathering from the US, AIIMS-M President and WHO Global Patient Safety Curriculum Working Group member Dr. T.S. Ravi Kumar said this year’s World Patient Safety Day was a watershed occasion as it sought to place patients as the most important stakeholder in the healthcare system, rather than as passive recipients of care.
Later, Dr. Bajpai, AIIMS-M Director Mukesh Tripathi, Hemwati Nandan Bahuguna Uttarakhand Medical Education University Vice-Chancellor Dr. Hem Chandra and other dignitaries felicitated Dr. P. Satyanarayana, former medical superintendent of NIMS-Hyderabad and founding director of Sri Venkateswara Institute of Medical Sciences, Tirupati.
