Human Factors and Patient Safety Level 2

To mitigate against human factors, we need to ensure staff are equipped with the underlying principles of risk assessment, error detection, situational and self-awareness, and develop an organisational culture that empowers individuals to speak up, regardless of their role or position.

This e-learning course highlights the importance of the following Human Factors principles: situational awareness, mental models, cognitive workload, civility, and approachability, speaking up and the behaviours to encourage these.

Learning Outcomes

• Recognise everyone working in healthcare can create patient safety by their behaviour.
• Explain why it is important to always have a clear understanding of the task at hand.
• Demonstrate the best ways of maintaining a clear and shared understanding of tasks.
• Describe how interruptions, distractions and incivility can impact task performance.
• Describe how to speak up if you see a potential issue and how to encourage approachability.
• Explain how a systems approach can be applied to the study of patient safety.