Report Emphasizes Importance of Safety in Medical Education

Unmet Needs: Teaching Physicians to Provide Safe Patient Care, a report by the Lucian Leape Institute at the National Patient Safety Foundation, suggests that more focus on patient safety, communication, and teamwork needs to be incorporated into the medical school curriculum.

Lucian Leape, MD, adjunct professor of health policy at the Harvard School of Public Health, said that too many new doctors are graduating without the leadership and communication skills that would help them to speak out when they witness an unsafe practice or event. Leape also called on hospitals to enforce a "culture of safety" in their facilities, which includes controlling disruptive patient behavior and encouraging professionalism.

A full copy of the report can be found here:
www.npsf.org/LLI-Unmet-Needs-Report.