Updates

Engagement-capable environments, cultural safety, patient safety and health equity can help us see care from different perspectives and deepen our understanding of what shapes safer care.

To inform its legislative reforms, the Government of New Brunswick undertook an extensive consultation over four years. During this time, they reached out to experts and partners within the province and across the country to learn from proven safety and privacy practices. Quality of care, patient safety and healthcare safety perspectives were also considered to ensure the new policy direction matched national standards.

For Rochelle Currie, a patient safety scorecard that shows a lot of yellow – and even maybe a little red – can be a welcome and refreshing sight. You might think it’s a surprising perspective from someone accountable for quality and patient safety across an entire province. Yet Currie knows from experience that the journey to safer care truly begins when organizations are willing to get curious about what’s really happening.

Every year, World Patient Safety Day provides an important opportunity to recognize patient safety as a global health priority and reflect on what each of us can do to make care safer.

At Riverview Health Centre, curiosity is part of the culture. Every question is an opportunity to learn something new and consider what could be done differently. That mindset keeps improvement moving - and shows how safer, more person-centred care is shaped in everyday moments.

What shapes safer care? Sometimes it’s a conversation. Sometimes it’s a relationship, a small improvement or a decision that helps someone feel heard, respected and safe.

Primary care teams see firsthand where the pressures on access show up everyday. They also know where the opportunities to improve access lie — which appointments could be handled differently, which workflows could be redesigned, which small changes could free up real capacity. Photo credit: Université de Sherbrooke

Over four months, more than 150 participants across Canada joined the Leading Safety Differently action series. They explored a shared question: how can everyday work contribute to safer care? Across the series, one message was clear: leading safety differently is shaped through relationships, trust, learning and ongoing dialogue, not only through formal patient safety systems and compliance.