Healthcare Safety in the Context of Primary Healthcare in Morocco

Abstract

Each year, many people suffer medical errors or lose their lives due to unsafe and poor-quality care. Most of these occurrences could be prevented. To date, most research on health security has focused mainly on health services' security in hospitals and has paid little attention to the context of primary healthcare, which represents the main means of achieving sustainable universal health coverage. This study falls within this perspective. Descriptive exploratory study, based on documentary analysis of health security studies in the context of primary healthcare, questionnaires and interviews, conducted with 300 professionals from primary healthcare establishments, following proportional stratified sampling. The main results revealed that, generally, the culture of safety in primary healthcare is poorly developed or even absent. More than 53% of respondents consider that the security level of primary healthcare is low. In addition, over 65% are unaware of errors that occur in their primary healthcare establishments. 40% declare the absence of a process for collecting and reporting medical errors or adverse effects related to healthcare. More than 60% of respondents consider that factors related to working conditions, daily tasks and organizational factors have a strong influence on healthcare safety. It is essential to improve healthcare safety and quality, which is an issue of global importance, and to act on several factors to reduce the incidence of adverse effects of care.