Incident management in healthcare

Perhaps even more so than other sectors, the healthcare field is prone to incidents and near-incidents, making appropriate incident management a vital policy component. Digital means of managing such risks give you the flexibility to do so in an effective manner that fits your particular specialisms and work procedures. Having the right incident management software available can save your organisation a world of trouble, as the ability to use incident management tools helps staff and executives prevent future incidents while addressing the ones that do occur to maximum effect.

Most importantly, however, incident management healthcare solutions improve patient safety. Providing the best possible care with minimal risks calls for incident management tools that integrate smoothly into your operation and procedures. Transparency and absence of unnecessary barriers help raise staff awareness and increase willingness to report incidents and potential risks without unnecessary fear of reprisal. That makes our incident management health applications the ideal match for your organisation, too.

What is incident management in healthcare?

What incident management can do for you becomes apparent as soon as you allow current issues to escalate without adequate measures in place. Indeed, the very meaning of incident management hinges on the concept of not letting incidents spiral out of control and cause unnecessary damage to the people you work for, and work with, on a daily basis. Addressing incidents head-on, with the right resources and measures in place, can prevent injury, grief, reputation damage, and decidedly negative financial consequences in short- and longer-term perspectives.

Over our decades of field experience, we have often been startled by how many officials ask us: “what does incident management mean in our specific setting?” The very fact that such basic service elements are not entirely clear and self-evident illustrates our point. Failure to recognise just what is incident management in service provision now equals accidents waiting to happen. If you have even the slightest suspicion that your organisation is not equipped to deal with any potential incident, the time act is now.

Allow us to illustrate precisely what is incident management with a simple example. Suppose one of your patients accidentally falls during transfer from their bed to a wheelchair. Physical injuries are likely to ensue, as well as psychological trauma and anxiety for both the patient and staff on duty. Eventually, the family may well decide to file legal procedures and demand compensation. Rest assured that the reputation of your facility will suffer correspondingly.

If you had enabled your personnel to communicate the physical difficulties of transferring patients in the confined space of their specific ward after the preceding two near-incidents, which no-one reported, all this could have been avoided. This only becomes more regrettable once you realise how easy, accessible, and affordable our incident management software is: especially in the healthcare sector, prevention is always better than cure.