Two-thirds of communication errors in healthcare relate to patient handoffs, according to The Joint Commission. After finding these handoffs were a root cause of miscommunication safety events, MD Anderson Cancer Center sought to flip the script.
In 2018, the Houston-based cancer center conducted a human factors analysis of safety events, which discovered the handoff communication issue. MD Anderson had piloted the I-PASS handoff tool in its gynecologic, oncology and pediatrics departments in 2014, which reduced communication errors by 50%. After the 2018 analysis, the hospital revisited its project.
In 2018, adherence to the EHR-integrated tool was 41.6%. After rolling out a hospital-wide campaign to increase utilization, adherence rose to 70.5% by 2022, according to research recently published in the Joint Commission Journal on Quality and Patient Safety.