[Resilience and patient safety: how can health care regulations contribute?]

The discussion on patient safety in the Netherlands appears to have reached an impasse. Healthcare professionals are feeling uncomfortable with the enormous increase in the numbers of norms and guidelines, the focus on error and the pressure from external parties. In this article, based on the conference Safety II and beyond - resilience meets regulation, held in Rotterdam, the Netherlands in June 2015, we discuss the underlying problems and propose an alternative approach to the concept of patient safety and to measures to guarantee this safety.