Improving service delivery using the self-reporting of errors by midwives and midwifery student

Reporting medical errors is one of the common methods for identifying and preventing mistakes in-hospital care. This study was conducted to identify the status of reporting and related factors in two groups of midwives and midwifery students.

This research was analytic correlational; it was conducted among all the midwives working in the midwifery and labor departments and midwifery students in Isfahan University of Medical Sciences. The data collection tool included a checklist of errors and the researcher-construed questionnaires of awareness and attitude toward reporting errors. The results were examined using descriptive and inferential statistics (ANOVA, Pearson and Spearman correlation coefficient, and independent t-test) by SPSS software version 20.

In this research, the error reporting in midwifery staff was 79.1% and the most frequent error was related to the patient's process of testing; the error reporting among the students was 90% and the most frequent error occurred in the labor processes. The present study also showed that there was a direct relationship between awareness and attitude toward reporting medical errors (P < 0.001), while there was not a significant relationship between the midwifery students' awareness and attitude toward reporting the medical errors (P = 0.31).

According to the study, hospital midwives reporting is less than midwifery students. Accordingly, it is recommended to focus on the error and risk management committee to strengthen the reporting system.