Effect of Daily Safety Briefing Huddles on the Reporting of Adverse Events and Near-misses

Background: Incident reporting offers valuable information regarding safety issues, but near-misses (NM) and adverse events (AE) remain underreported. DSB huddles help foster collective situational awareness that increases an organization’s capacity to respond to safety concerns. However, effects of DSB huddles on AE/NM reporting remain understudied. Objective: To examine how daily safety briefing (DSB) huddles operate in a surgical unit, and assess their impact on reporting of adverse events and near-misses. Methods: DSB huddles were piloted in a gastrointestinal surgical unit. The study compared AE/NM reporting rates and reporting types before and after adopting DSB huddles. Results: After adopting DSB huddles, AE reporting improved from 0.9% to 1.8%, and NM reporting improved from 0.5% to 7.1% (p < .05). Self-reporting of safety issues increased from 44.4% to 73.8%; NM reporting domains increased from 6 to 15. Conclusions: DSB huddles increased reporting rates of AE and of NM particularly, improved reporting dimensions of NM, and increased team members’ situational patient safety awareness