[Error reporting from a nurse's point of view: results of a survey in nursing homes and hospitals]

The aim of this study was to gain insight into the reporting of errors as perceived by nurses employed in inpatient health-care facilities.

A representative written survey of nurses working in German nursing homes and hospitals was conducted.

The 1100 respondents reported an average of 1.9 errors in the last half year, with nurses working in nursing homes reporting more errors than hospital-employed ones. They estimated that 20.5% of all errors are reported. One third of the participants did not know what events should be reported; more than 20% feared repercussions and mentioned a lack of feedback on error reports. RESULTS are not statistically associated to the presence or absence of an error reporting system, but there are hints for organisational advantages and workload-related disadvantages of systematic forms of reporting. Reporting behaviour was also related to the perception of factors concerning the organisation of the actual reporting of errors.

Defining reportable error events, organisational barriers to report errors and deficits in the dealing with errors and error reports have to be tackled to augment error reporting rates and profit from reporting systems.