for staff and education for patients.
With regards to monitoring, since 2009,
National law states that hospitals and healthcare
trusts have to monitor sentinel events,
transmitting specific reports to the National
Health Ministry.
Another important initiative, the National
Outcome Evaluation Programme, started in 2011,
has been promoted by Agenas (National Agency
for Regional Health Services). Agenas collects
records from hospital trusts and health local
trusts and calculates specific indicators of quality,
such as the percentage of femur neck fractures
being treated by surgery within two days, and the
percentage of AMI being treated by PTCA within
two days. The aim is monitoring quality of care
by means of indicators coming from a routine
database so that this monitoring has to be
incorporated in the control system of each health
organisation, on a regular basis.
Regarding a multi-sectoral approach, the most
advanced experience is the Pilot Project
CARMINA, started in 2010 and supported by the
National Health Ministry. It is based on a self-
assessment questionnaire aimed at evaluating the
level of patient safety of an organisation. Each
health organisation is tested through 52 items
covering the following main areas: safety culture,
communication, human resources, safe
Italy
Mr Domenico Mantoan
HOPE Governor, Veneto Region
Could you outline the strategy/approach
adopted in your country on quality and
patient safety or the two/three initiatives
in the hospital and healthcare sector in the
past ten years?
Quality and patient safety are prominent issues of
the Italian health policy. National legislation states
that patient safety is in itself a part of the right to
health. Promoting quality means to promote
a multi-sectoral strategy, involving staff, patients,
strengthening a safety-culture which would be
incorporated in each health organisation. Many
actions addressing towards this direction, are
stated by Italian National Law for monitoring
se