[Do Leadership WalkRounds™ increase patient safety incident reports? A retrospective cohort study]

To evaluate whether Leadership WalkRounds™ (LW) are associated with increasing patient safety incidents (PSI) reports in primary care setting.

Design. Retrospective cohort study.

The 264 primary care centers of an autonomous community. Years 2017-2024 (excluding 2020 and the first half of 2021).

Study unit: center-year (each primary care center in different years are different units). Exposed cohort: centers-years with LW in that year; unexposed cohort: centers-years without LW.

Main: increase in PSI reports (month following LW vs. same month on the previous year). Secondary: effect at 6 months and 48h after LW; size of the center and type of PSI report (incidents/medication errors).

Comparison of the increase in PSI reports in centers-years with and without LW (Student's t-test).

N=1577 center-years analyzed. The mean increase in PSI reports was higher in center-years with LW (+0.23) vs. those without LW (-0.14) (p=0.002). No differences were observed at 6 months. The 29% (95% CI: 25-33%) of the PSI reports were performed within the first 48h. The increase was higher in smaller centers (+0.32 vs. -0.11; p=0.011). The increase was higher for incidents compared to medication errors (0.22 vs. 0.17; p<0.05).

The implementation of LW in primary care was associated with increasing PSI reporting in the following month, especially within the first 48h. Increasing was higher in smaller centers and for incidents than for medication errors. This study shows the usefulness of LW for one of their objectives: improving communication and reporting.