Patient Safety Incidents in Operating Rooms Reported in the Past Five Years (2017-2021) in Korea

Patient safety incidents in the operating room require special attention because they can cause catastrophic and irreversible conditions in patients. Although patient safety incidents have different characteristics, there may be similarities and patterns of risk factors that may be common. Therefore, this study analyzed factors associated with the PSIs by analyzing data from the Korean Patient Safety Reports from 2017 to 2019.

The "Patient Safety Incidents Data from 2017 to 2021" systematically collected by the Korea Institute for Healthcare Accreditation, include patient safety incident reports from medical institutions. Data on 1140 patient safety incidents in the operating room were analyzed. They included patients' gender and age, Hospital size, Incident seasons, incident time, Incident reporter, incident type, Medical department, and Incident severity. The Incident severity was analyzed by dividing it into three stages: near miss, adverse event, sentinel event, which are applied by domestic medical institutions.

The highest number of OR patient safety incidents were related to surgery and anesthesia. On analyzing the probability of adverse events based on near misses, the significant variables were patient gender, incident reporter, incident type, and Medical department. Additionally, the factors that were likely to precipitate sentinel events based on near misses were patient gender, incident time, reporter, and incident type.

To prevent sentinel events in Patient safety incidents, female and during night shifts are required to pay close attention. Moreover, it is necessary to establish a patient safety reporting system in which not only all medical personnel, but also patients, generally, can actively participate in patient safety activities.