Robert Bosack, DDS, Michael Rollert, DDS and Stuart Lieblich, DMD, on behalf of their Board of Directors, Advisory and Consulting Committees were pleased to formally introduce the Dental Patient Safety Foundation to an audience of over 400 attendees. The Dental Patient Safety Foun-dation (DPSF) has been created for the sole purpose of improving the safety and quality of dental care in the United States.
About the DPSF
The Dental Patient Safety Foundation is an independent, non-profit organization whose only mis-sion is to improve safety and quality of dental care, regardless of specialty, by non-partisan col-lecting, aggregating and analyzing information about patient safety events, which can be safely, voluntarily and confidentially reported in its reporting tool. All licensed health care practitioners are invited and encouraged to repeatedly and frequently submit any concerns or incidents regard-ing patient safety reports via the DPSF REPORTING TOOL, which can be found the their website. Full confidentiality of all reports is protected by the federal government.
The DPSF is a listed Patient Safety Organization (P0198) in compliance with the Patient Safety Rule of the Federal Department of Health and Human Services, which legally protects and main-tains the confidentiality of all disclosures. The Patient Safety Rule was enacted to encourage vol-untary reporting of sensitive information without the risk of discovery or liability.
The 2 most important aspects of the DPSF mission, however, are the creation and ongoing sup-port of a culture of safety and the frequent and swift reporting back to the dental profession to reduce risks, minimize hazards and improve the quality of dental care. These reports will be de-veloped and circulated on a monthly basis and will be made available on the DPSF website. The Foundation hopes that all organized dentistry will appreciate the value of this mission and offer tangible support. A true culture of safety requires lifelong commitment and participation.
How Can I Help To Improve Patient Safety
SPREAD THE WORD: Encourage your colleagues and organizations to support this profession-wide culture of safety initiative.
REPORT OFTEN: Visit the DPSF website and use the confidential reporting tool to share near misses, unsafe conditions or patient harm. Examples include wrong site procedures, medical or anesthetic misadventures, lapses in infection control, among many others. Reports can be made anonymously or confidentially, for those wishing direct feedback. Information about events in the past is also welcome.
LEARN AND IMPROVE: Sign up to receive monthly safety reports immediately after release.
CONTRIBUTE: The DPSF is a non-profit organization that relies solely on outside financial support.
https://www.dentalpatientsafety.org
