After 5 years of action: has patient safety culture improved in the Belgian hospitals? Results of a benchmark database

Abstract

ABSTRACT Introduction: Reason (1998) highlights that safety culture 'is a concept whose time has come', stating that there is both a challenge and an opportunity to develop a clear theoretical understanding of organizational issues to create a principled basis for more effective culture enhancing practices. An organization requires safety culture as a product of combined effects of organizational culture, professional culture and often national culture. These organizations include hospitals where patient safety culture is a major area of concern. Objective: This study seeks to know if there are differences in safety culture between Belgian hospitals. It also seeks to know if there were significant variations in safety culture over time (5 years) and also to investigate possible covariates that could have a significant effect on dimensional scores.12 Dimensional scores including 2 outcome dimensions were used as tools in investigating safety culture. Methodology: The data set of inte