Commitment to Quality and Safety

Commitment to Quality and Safety

At Brown University Health, the safety and well-being of our patients comes first. Our staff monitor all aspects of patient safety, proactively identifying potential failure points in our processes and procedures, and use that information to prevent errors before they occur. We continually measure our progress against local and national standards to ensure that we remain the best in our profession. We compile and publish data about patient safety at Brown University Health facilities, and we make this information available to the public on our websites.

Two hospital staff members chat with a patient in her hospital room

An Ongoing Commitment to Our Patients and Families

Because we consider patient safety to be an ongoing initiative, we consistently strive to make improvements, and we welcome questions from our patients and feedback about the care they receive at our facilities.

All our hospitals use SafetyNet, a patient safety reporting system that uses performance improvement and patient safety tools developed by the University HealthSystem Consortium, an organization that represents the nation's leading academic medical centers. SafetyNet encourages prompt follow-up on patient safety events and identifies trends across the Brown University Health system as well as other health care systems of similar size and complexity.

We also report patient outcomes in several categories to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Its website, Hospital Compare, makes it easy for patients to see how often hospitals across the country provide the recommended care for certain common conditions. Information at the Hospital Compare website rates quality of care for adult patients treated for heart attack, heart failure, pneumonia, and surgery.