Patient Safety Bias Reporting Pilot
This month (June 2024), Valley is undergoing a three-month pilot lead by our Safety and Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Departments where all caregivers will be encouraged to submit safety events if bias impacts the healthcare we deliver to our patients and families*. Caregivers reporting a safety event will be prompted to answer a question inquiring if bias played a role in the safety event.
*incidents concerning bias impacting staff should be reported to the Human Resources Department.
Our commitment
Valley Medical Center values embracing Equity, Diversity and Inclusion and treating people with respect and compassion. We strive to create a healing environment for our patients that embodies those elements, which means learning more about how bias and discrimination impact our patients. We realize there are times when individuals at all levels in our system engage in biased behaviors which adversely impact the healing experience of our patients. Having a proactive and anonymous approach for caregivers to report these incidents helps us learn and provide more equitable care for our patients.
What is bias?
Valley defines bias** as favoring or opposing an object, person/people or concept based on learned or lived experiences. Biases can either be explicit/conscious or implicit/unconscious. Bias is any discrimination based on perception of ability, age, caregiver status, ethnicity, gender, gender identity, housing status, immigration background, job class/discipline, language, nationality, physical appearance, race, religion, sexual orientation, socioeconomic background, and veteran status. When indicating bias in a safety event, caregivers will be able to specify bias based on these categories. A caregiver should indicate bias if bias impacts the healthcare we deliver to our patients and families.
**Something does not necessarily need to rise to the level of a hate crime (malicious harassment as defined in RCW 9A.36.080) to constitute a bias incident.
What happens after I indicate bias occurred in this patient safety event?
The process will be the same as any regular safety event that is submitted. The department manager will be notified of the event. For events that include bias, the EDI Program Manager will be notified as well. The department manager and EDI Program Manager will collaborate to review the safety event and appropriately respond. The purpose of this tool is to better understand how bias and discrimination shows up in the care we provide our patients so that we may learn and provide more equitable care for our patients.
FAQs:
Will my report result in an investigation of the matter? Incident/safety reporting is neither a formal investigative process nor an oversight body. Individuals who submit an incident report, may not be reached out to individually. Our goal is to identify trends and patterns to help inform strategic decisions to improve care for our community.
Just Culture applies to all safety events, including ones where bias is indicated. This means that no caregiver will be penalized for reporting bias or being included in a report where bias is indicated. It is also important to understand that bias is a perception, this pilot will help us learn more about the impacts of gathering this data.
Why should I submit a safety event when I perceive bias? One of the challenges in large organizations is that most instances of bias or discrimination are not reported. By having a proactive way to identify areas and topics that need attention, we can develop more targeted interventions to improve the care we provide our community. While you may choose to submit an anonymous report we encourage you to share your information. However, we welcome anonymous reports to enhance our collective knowledge and understanding of the current climate.
Can I report anonymously? Yes. Just like with regular safety events, there is an option to report anonymously.
How will the data on bias incidents be used? The high-level data that we collect will be used to understand bias patterns in how we care for our patients, that may result in improvements to policies, processes and/or ongoing education. The data helps us to make recommendations for strategic approaches to equity.
What will happen after the pilot is completed? The Equity, Diversity and Inclusion and Safety team will be analyzing all the bias reports in the pilot period and feedback from surveys from those who participated to create recommendations for improvement and adoption to be presented to our Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Steering Committee for decision-making.