Respond

The focus of CQI+ is to enable proactive interventions to reduce the risk of practice incidents occurring in a pharmacy practice; however, it is equally important to respond appropriately when practice incidents occur. These unfortunate events are upsetting to patients, their caregivers, and pharmacy team members alike, particularly when patients experience harm, and our subsequent actions can play an important role in minimizing both physical and psychological harm to all individuals involved.

Each element of the pharmacy team’s expected response must be documented in the pharmacy’s policies and procedures so all team members can participate in a consistent response.

A comprehensive response to a practice incident includes

• first ensuring the immediate safety of the patient and others who may be affected,
• disclosure and apology,
• gathering of information about the incident and discussion with the pharmacy team,
• documentation of the incident details,
• analysis of the incident to determine contributing factors and root causes,
• development of action plans to address the contributing factors and root causes, and
• providing feedback to the patient or their agent(s) about the results of the analysis and the specific actions taken as a result.

The pharmacy’s chosen practice incident management platform should support these activities.