On September 17, the 6th World Patient Safety Day campaign was celebrated. It was created by the World Health Organization (WHO) in their effort to enhance global public health.
The theme for this year’s World Patient Safety Day was focused on improving diagnosis for patient safety, using the slogan “Get it right, make it safe!”. Patients and families, health workers, health care leaders, policy makers, institutions and civil society were called on to emphasize the pivotal role of correct and timely diagnosis in improving patient safety.If we use a four part framework of personal, population health, policy and planetary health, then there is quite a lot to be done in making the right diagnosis for each of these spheres of health on World Patient Safety Day.
For the personal, we have patients and their physicians collaborating to improve the diagnosis for patient safety. Making the correct diagnosis is the first step towards starting on the path to proper treatment, even as we seek to prevent adverse events from the prescribed treatment. And often, the diagnosis and treatment is simply (albeit, sometimes not so simply) avoiding the behaviors and lifestyle factors that contribute to the majority of chronic diseases in this country.
Next, we have the intersection of population health and policy, a space where many Preventive Medicine physicians practice. This is a tricky ecosystem in which to work, as that all powerful force, politics, comes into play. While the diagnosis may be correct to protect patient safety, the political will may be absent to get the required resources to protect the health of the population or to change a policy that can cause harm, and thus, patient safety can be compromised.
Lastly, we come to the question of what is the correct diagnosis for patient safety taking a planetary health perspective? Planetary health concerns itself with governance and stewardship which pose a threat to the sustainability of the human civilization, environment and planet.2
It is not sufficient to say we have a problem with climate change. We must make the correct diagnosis and begin treatment of the ills that afflict the planet now, or it will be much too late, far too soon! And not just patient safety will be impacted. Instead, we may all be wiped out by conflict, nationalism and competition; by poor health due to climate change as a result of political inaction; and by the inability of agricultural technology to keep up with the dietary needs of a population racing towards nine billion souls. On this “Pale Blue Dot” as Carl Sagan called Mother Earth, we need to recognize that the economy, energy, agriculture, water and health are all interconnected, and without making the right diagnosis about what ails our planet and starting to fix it, patient safety may no longer matter.
Thus, we know that we have to “Get it right and make it safe!”, especially if we are to successfully survive on planet earth.
Mirza I. Rahman, MD, MPH, FAAFP, FACPM
ACPM President
- WHO: World Patient safety Day. https://www.who.int/campaigns/world-patient-safety-day/world-patient-safety-day-2024
- Horton, Richard; Lo, Selina (2015). "Planetary health: a new science for exceptional action". The Lancet. 386 (10007): 1921–1922. doi:10.1016/s0140-6736(15)61038-8. PMID 26188746.