Grant: Master's Award: Canada Graduate Scholarships

Patient and staff safety within healthcare has become a growing concern over the last 15 years.1, 3-6 The correlation between staff safety and patient safety is well established;4, 21 yet many safety response systems do not operationalize this connection. While there is a growing interest to involve patients in safety initiatives,22 strategies to involve them is an under researched area.23 This study taps into the Saskatoon Health Region's groundbreaking project, developing a Safety Alert System (SAS) with and for staff and patients. Specifically, the study will examine how systems theory can assist in amalgamating all patient and staff safety response processes within a healthcare system, involve patients, families, and staff, and examine potential cost savings, improved process effectiveness and organizational absorptive capacity. A review of available research offered no evidence of other research on projects of this nature. As the internal consultant assigned to the SAS, I am in an ideal position to complete this research project. This study will use an action research methodology and employ a mixed methods sequential priorities design. The statistical evaluation will explore improvements to program effectiveness and opportunities to reduce health care costs. This research will generate new methodological knowledge related to safety process amalgamation within a healthcare organization using a Lean management system. Upon completion, this study will add to a growing body of knowledge about prevention, patient involvement, and organizational response to error in high-consequence environments.