Patient safety in long-term care in Japan

Abstract

As Japan progresses toward a “super-aging society,” long-term care facilities will become increasingly important, as they will be needed to provide effective long-term healthcare services to elderly people in need. In promoting patient safety initiatives, “reporting first” is essential to address accidents in a timely manner. In Japan, a national accident reporting system, the Project to Collect Medical Near-Miss/Adverse Event Information, was launched in 2004, and the Medical Accident Investigation System was launched in 2015. Meanwhile, the information on accidents that local governments gather from long-term care facilities is not necessarily utilized for safety among the affected population. For this reason, efforts are being made to standardize reporting forms and strengthen the safety management system at these facilities, with a view to establishing a system to utilize this information at the national level in the future. Further, from interview data on the status of efforts at long-term care facilities, it is clear that more initiatives are needed at both the facility and municipal levels to develop a coordinated system to prevent accidents (reporting, analysis, planning of countermeasures, implementation, evaluation, etc.). There is a need for training multiple professionals, including users and their families, for collaboration in long-term care patient safety. This paper offers an overview of the current state of patient safety undertakings in long-term care settings in Japan today.