TY - JOUR
T1 - Patient safety and the question of dignitary harms
AU - Mitchell, Polly
AU - Cribb, Alan
AU - Entwistle, Vikki A.
N1 - Funding Information:
We are grateful to James Wilson for his insightful comments and suggestions, and to Rob Simpson for his invaluable advice at an early stage in the writing process. Many thanks to two anonymous reviewers for their thoughtful and constructive comments. This work was supported by the Wellcome Trust [209811]. There are no supporting data relating to this work.
Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2023. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Journal of Medicine and Philosophy Inc.
PY - 2023/2/17
Y1 - 2023/2/17
N2 - Patient safety is a central aspect of healthcare quality, focusing on preventable, iatrogenic harm. Harm, in this context, is typically assumed to mean physical injury to patients, often caused by technical error. However, some contributions to the patient safety literature have argued that disrespectful behavior towards patients can cause harm, even when it does not lead to physical injury. This paper investigates the nature of such dignitary harms and explores whether they should be included within the scope of patient safety as a field of practice. We argue that dignitary harms in health care are-at least sometimes-preventable, iatrogenic harms. While we caution against including dignitary harms within the scope of patient safety just because they are relevantly similar to other iatrogenic harms, we suggest that thinking about dignitary harms can help to elucidate the value of patient safety, and to illuminate the evolving relationship between safety and quality.
AB - Patient safety is a central aspect of healthcare quality, focusing on preventable, iatrogenic harm. Harm, in this context, is typically assumed to mean physical injury to patients, often caused by technical error. However, some contributions to the patient safety literature have argued that disrespectful behavior towards patients can cause harm, even when it does not lead to physical injury. This paper investigates the nature of such dignitary harms and explores whether they should be included within the scope of patient safety as a field of practice. We argue that dignitary harms in health care are-at least sometimes-preventable, iatrogenic harms. While we caution against including dignitary harms within the scope of patient safety just because they are relevantly similar to other iatrogenic harms, we suggest that thinking about dignitary harms can help to elucidate the value of patient safety, and to illuminate the evolving relationship between safety and quality.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85148307195&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - https://doi.org/10.1093/jmp/jhac035
DO - https://doi.org/10.1093/jmp/jhac035
M3 - Article
SN - 0360-5310
VL - 48
SP - 33
EP - 49
JO - Journal of Medicine and Philosophy
JF - Journal of Medicine and Philosophy
IS - 1
ER -