Glossary of Terms
- AE
- Adverse Event (AE) is defined as an injury or complication which results in disability or prolongation of hospital stay and was caused by the healthcare received rather than by the disease from which the patient suffered. The AE could either occur during the hospital admission, or during an earlier contact with healthcare services, and was responsible for all or part of the hospital admission.
- Clinical Error
-
An act of commission or omission that caused, or contributed to the cause of, the unintended injury.
for errors of commission this will usually be the immediate morbid consequences of the error
for errors of omission this will usually be the continuation of, and consequences of, an existing morbid state that could have been cut short, or had a better outcome, if the error had not occurred.
- EPR
-
Electronic patient record. This contains a patient's administrative details (name, address, DOB, condition etc) and increasingly, relevant clinical information for example pathology reports, scans, pharmaceutical information etc.
- HIS
-
Hospital Information System. Usually the main information system that provides patient data, administration control, financial reporting, inventory management.
- Prevention Strategy
-
Changes in the system in which an error occurred that may reduce the probability of the error occurring, increase the probability that the error would be remedied before an unintentional injury occurred.
- Preventability
-
Preventability of an AE was assessed by the detection of "an error in management due to the failure to follow accepted practice at an individual or system level"; accepted practice was taken to be "the current level of expected performance for the average practitioner or system that manages the condition in question".
- MET
-
Medical emergency team. Usually a MET is called to assist a patient that has or is about to suffer a cardiac arrest.
- NFR
-
Not for resuscitation. Patient not to be revived if she or he has a cardiac arrest.
- PAS
-
Patient Administration System. Used to capture typical administration details on each patient that is admitted.
- PDA
-
Personal digital assistant.
- LAN/WLAN
-
Local area network /wireless local area network.