Guide to Improving Patient Safety in Primary Care Settings by Engaging Patients and Families
About the Guide
The Guide to Improving Patient Safety in Primary Care Settings by Engaging Patients and Families (the Guide) is a resource to help primary care practices partner with patients and their families to improve patient safety. The Guide is composed of materials and resources to help primary care practices implement patient and family engagement to improve patient safety.
Breakdowns in patient safety in primary care are real. An environmental scan on the topic identified several key threats to patient safety amenable to improvement through patient and family engagement. Errors in diagnosis, breakdowns in communication, unsafe medication practices, and fragmentation of care all contributed to poor patient safety in primary care settings. Patient and family engagement in primary care helps forge trusting relationships that promote safety.
Materials in the Guide
The Guide is composed of materials and tools to support adoption of patient and family engagement into practice.
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- Quick Start Guide
- Full Guide [PDF, 3.3 MB]
- Infographic [PDF, 316 KB].
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Acknowledgments
Project Team
This project was led by the MedStar Health Research Institute. To contact the project team, email Kelly Smith, Ph.D., project principal investigator at kellym.smith@utoronto.ca.
Development Partners
The partners for this work included Project Patient Care, Consumers Advancing Patient Safety, MedStar Institute for Quality and Safety, Prince George's County Department of Health, Capital Area Primary Care Research Network (CAPRICORN), Clinical Directors Network, CVS Health, Iowa Healthcare Collaborative, and Telligen Quality Innovation Network-Quality Improvement Organization.
Dissemination Partners
The dissemination partners for this work included MedStar Institute for Quality and Safety, Project Patient Care, Consumers Advancing Patient Safety, Institute for Healthcare Improvement–National Patient Safety Foundation, Institute for Patient- and Family-Centered Care, American Association of Nurse Practitioners, National Nurse-led Care Consortium, Prince George's County Department of Health, Capital Area Primary Care Research Network (CAPRICORN), Clinical Directors Network, CVS Health, Iowa Healthcare Collaborative, and Telligen Quality Innovation Network-Quality Improvement Organization.
