Topics of the WHO Patient Safety Curriculum Guide Proposals: How to Implement Them in the Medical Career and Evaluate...

The harm to patients continues to involve a high burden of injury, disability, social cost, and death worldwide. To improve patient safety (PS) education, the WHO created a PS Curriculum Guide to assist multisectoral institutions. However, not much progress has been made in undergraduate studies.

To establish steps and activities to easily and successfully integrate the topics of the WHO PS Curriculum Guide into the existing undergraduate curricula in the medical career.

Mixed methods research (MMR), integrating quantitative and qualitative methods (2019-2024) to assess the strategies carried out in the medical faculty of the private Universidad Francisco de Vitoria (Spain) for the proper implementation of the WHO PS Curriculum Guide: curriculum mapping, curricular intervention, implementation, monitoring, evaluation by the academic committee of PS, and assessment.

All WHO's PS topics (n=11) were included in the teaching guides of some subjects (n=14) across all academic years in 2019. However, in some years, certain topics were taught but were missing in the teaching guide while others were not taught despite appearing in the guide (topic 10 [PS and invasive procedures] was not taught in any year). These findings promoted changes in the teaching guidelines for all academic years, an expansion of PS matters in some of the 14 subjects, the addition of new teaching activities, and improvements in assessment methods (e.g., new OSCE-4^th in 2021). Since its implementation, an increase in the OSCE-4^th score was observed. In 2024, all the PS topics included in the teaching guides were taught in the classes and vice versa.

Comprehensive and integrated PS education in undergraduate medicine is feasible and impactful without implying an additional burden. It is a necessary foundation for building better healthcare from the early stages.