An international comparison of approaches to patient safety (7 March 2025)

Summary

This blog describes the approach taken by researchers at the Exeter HSDR Evidence Synthesis Centre when they performed a systematic review on safety management systems in healthcare. They research practice in five English-speaking high-income countries: The Netherlands,  Australia, Canada, Ireland and New Zealand. Having started their literature review, the team realised that whilst the components of a safety management system—leadership commitment and safety policy, safety risk management, safety assurance and safety promotion and culture—were present in the patient safety approaches of all of the countries we were looking at, only one of them had actually implemented safety management systems in their healthcare system. This resulted in a change of approach which looked at the differences in how key components of a safety management system were implemented.

Read the research study: The implementation of Safety Management Systems in healthcare: a systematic review and international comparison (March 2025)