Safety first as top priority also in the operating room
Wherever people work, mistakes happen - including during surgical procedures. In order to prevent these as far as possible, the Patient Safety Foundation has created the "Safe Surgery Declaration" charter. The core of the charter is a checklist to identify and avoid errors at an early stage. The FMH is clearly in favour of this charter and recommends the checklist for hospitals and clinics that perform surgery.
Patients should be able to count on optimal medical care. Ensuring the quality of medical care is therefore one of the core tasks of the medical profession, and this also applies to surgical treatments. Since undesirable events such as surgical mix-ups or infections in the operating theatre are possible despite a highly trained and well-rehearsed surgical team, careful preparation and optimal perioperative procedures, the Swiss Patient Safety Foundation has developed a checklist as the core element of a pilot project together with the Swiss Society of Surgery and ten Swiss hospitals.
This is based on the WHO surgical checklist and has been specially adapted for Switzerland. The purpose of the checklist is to avoid errors or to catch them in time in order to increase patient safety. Numerous hospitals already use it in their daily work. To ensure that the checklist becomes the norm for all Swiss hospitals performing surgery, the FMH, medical societies and other healthcare organisations have endorsed the "Safe Surgery Declaration" charter. The FMH recommends that the medical organisations concerned apply the checklist and also involve all the professional groups involved.
The FMH
The FMH, the Swiss Medical Association, has long been committed to patient safety and contributes to medical quality work through the Swiss Academy for Quality in Medicine SAQM. In addition, as one of the founding members, the FMH has supported and promoted the Swiss Patient Safety Foundation from the outset. In addition, the FMH is represented in various foundation committees and supports numerous projects to improve quality.
For more details about the FMH and information about the new checklist, see http://www.fmh.ch
