TNMU Associate Professor Participated in a Seminar on Medical Quality and Safety

On May 11-19, 2024, Tetiana Kovalchuk, Associate Professor of TNMU Department of Paediatrics No. 2, took part in the professional seminar “Medical quality and safety” at the Open Medical Institute in Salzburg (Austria).

Participants of the seminar from 23 countries of the world.

The Open Medical Institute is an international initiative for healthcare professionals that aims to improve healthcare on a global scale. The program was established in 1993 by the American Austrian Foundation in close cooperation with the Weill Cornell Medical College and the Open Society Foundations. The loss of qualified doctors and health care workers in developing countries due to their migration to Western countries is the greatest obstacle to medical progress worldwide. Many medical facilities in Central and Eastern Europe, the Middle East, Latin America, and Africa lack qualified personnel, equipment, and supplies. Doctors in these countries do not have access to the most modern knowledge, technology and continuing medical education. As a result, many people leave their countries for education. The longer they stay abroad, the less likely they are to return home. To prevent brain drain and create conditions for qualified professionals to remain in their countries, the open medical institute offers a number of postgraduate education programs and mentors of medical professionals.

Associate Professor Tetiana Kovalchuk takes part in the discussion.

Patient safety is a fundamental foundation in the healthcare delivery system. However, avoidable adverse events, errors, and healthcare-related risks remain major patient safety challenges worldwide. The seventy-second session of the World Health Assembly in 2019 adopted resolution WHA72.6 on global action on patient safety and mandated the development of a global action plan on patient safety. This global action plan was adopted by the Seventy-fourth World Health Assembly in 2021 with the vision of “a world where no one is harmed by health care and every patient receives safe and respectful care, every time, everywhere.” The Action Plan aims to provide Member States and other stakeholders with an action-oriented framework to facilitate the implementation of strategic patient safety measures at all levels of health systems worldwide over the next 10 years (2021-2030).

Tetiana Kovalchuk (right) with her colleague Viktoria Teslenko (left) from the National Military Medical Clinical Centre “Chief Military Clinical Hospital”.

The seminar breakout sessions discussed ways to provide strategic direction for all possible stakeholders to address avoidable harm in health care and improve patient safety across practice areas through policy action on health care safety and quality, and to implement recommendations at the point of care. Leading scientific and educational staff from the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia introduced participants to an understanding of the current state of medical quality and safety, the features of systems thinking and patient safety, including psychological safety, methods of safety investigation and root cause analysis, the root causes and mechanisms of the influence of cognitive bias. Particular attention was paid to the issues of project selection and goal setting, selection of the right team and stakeholder analysis, tools for improving medical quality and safety, change management and behavioral economics in health care.

During the certificate presentation ceremony (left to right): Wolfgan Aulitzky (MD), Ron Keren (MD, MPH), Tetiana Kovalchuk, Daniel Hyman (MD, MMM), Jessica Hart (MD, MHQS), Meghan Galligan (MD, MSHP) .

During the seminar, a better understanding of the current trends in the development of medical quality and safety in the world was obtained, as well as the leading experience of specialists of the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia in the organization of patient safety in the form of prevention of errors and adverse consequences related to the provision of medical care, methods of safety investigation and analysis root causes of medical errors and adverse consequences. Based on the results of the discussions, further priorities for the exchange of experience and cooperation in the study of this issue were determined.

The information and photographs were provided by Tetiana Kovalchuk.