Incidents, major incidents, and complaints
Our professional work daily and with passion to give patients the best care. Sometimes unfortunately things do not go according to plan, and an incident or major incident may occur. A patient may also have an unpleasant experience and make a complaint. In all cases our policy is to help the patient in question and/or their family members to the best of our ability, and to learn actively from an incident, major incident or complaint. We hereby want to prevent similar situations in the future and further improve the quality of our care and the safety of our patients.
Figure 1: Number of patient-care incidents reported (MIP)
The number of incident reports went down from previous years. This development is in line with a countrywide trend that we see at academic hospitals.
Figure 2: Number of reports of (possible) major incidents
Internal reports | Potential incidents | Ultimate incidents | ||
2016 | 136 | 66 | 42 | |
2017 | 98 | 49 | 32 | |
2018 | 71 | 39 | 25 | |
2019 | 74 | 43 | 21 | |
2020 | 57 | 21 | 18 | |
2021 | 55 | 23 | 8 | |
2022 | 58 | 21* | 4* |
*not yet finalized
The number of (possible) major incidents in 2022 remained at around the same level as in 2021 and 2020 and is similar to that of other UMCs.
Figure 3: Number of complaints at Complaints Mediation
The total number of complaints in 2022 went up from 2021. After the most intense period of the covid pandemic when the number of complaints dropped sharply, we see the number of complaints stabilizing towards the pre-pandemic level.
Patient Support and Peer Support
A major incident, incident or other upsetting care-related event has a big impact on the patient in question and their family, as well as on caregivers. We therefor offer patients and their families support from the Quality & Patient Safety department, including via Patient Support. Colleagues support each other through a formal collegial structure (Peer Supporter network). Colleagues also support each other informally.
In 2021 we offered Patient Support 33 times (21 in 2021). The Peer Support team gave colleagues one-on-one Peer Support 69 times in 2022 (50 times in 2021) following traumatic events at the hospital. In 2022 we also conducted a number of group discussions with colleagues after serious events at various departments in the hospital.
Read more about how we handle incidents , major incidents and complaints at UMC Utrecht.
