Patient Safety Culture: From Perception to Assessment

Introduction: The patient safety culture constitutes the basis for the development of safe processes and better outcomes for the patients, as it favors the implementation of safe practices. Objectives: The present study aims to assess the patient safety culture in the perception of a multidisciplinary team. Methods: This was a quantitative and qualitative cross-sectional study with 284 professionals who answered the Hospital Survey on Patient Safety Culture questionnaire adapted to Brazil, which measures 12 safety culture dimensions. The reliability of the instrument was verified by the Cronbach’s Alpha coefficient. The dependent variables were the percentages of positive answers to estimate strengths and weaknesses in each dimension. EpiData 3.1, the Stata 14.2 software and IRAMUTEQ 0.7.2.0 were used for data processing. Results: The dimensions best assessed were “Supervisor/Manager expectations and actions promoting patient safety” (68.0%) and “Organizational learning and continuous improvement” (67.0%). The aspects requiring improvements were “Non-punitive response to error” (20.0%) and “Staffing” (31.0%). Other organizational weaknesses were identified from the comments regarding infrastructure, work processes and management support, which can have repercussions in the adoption of the safe practices. In this study, Cronbach’s Alpha presented a global value of 0.60. The “time working in the profession” variable (p-value = 0.033) presented an association with the “overall patient safety grade”; whereas “age” (p = 0.004) was associated with “number of adverse events in the last year”. Conclusion: The findings indicate the need for changes in the patient safety culture and in organizational management.