Communication and teamwork

Effective communication and teamwork is essential for safe, high quality patient care.

Communication has been identified as a significant (16 to 18%) contributing factor to medical error in South Australia and globally from 2003 to 2008 (World Health Organisation - Communication During Patient Handovers).

Communication and teamwork improvement is a safety and quality priority in South Australia. Three key strategies for improving communication and teamwork in SA Health are:

Clinical handover

Clinical handover is a health care team communication process critical to ensuring safe patient care. Improvement of clinical handover is a key SA Health patient safety strategy.

TeamSTEPPS^®

TeamSTEPPS® is an evidence-based program to improve teamwork and communication for the purpose of improving patient safety. This program is being implemented state-wide.

SafeTECH

Electronic health information systems can play an important role in supporting health care teams in effective communication of clinical information. SafeTECH - Safe use of electronic clinical handover tools is designed to promote the safe use of these tools.