This column supports the global mantra to develop mechanisms that address the worldwide crisis in patient safety and demonstrates, using nursing as an example, that the mechanisms currently being developed are too limited. Patient safety initiatives must be expanded to acknowledge and make ways to minimize mis-takes, that is, misconceptions of meaning that emerge when healthcare professionals dismiss, misconstrue, guess, or undervalue patients’ perspectives. Commitment to the human becoming school of thought as a guide for practice is suggested as one way to address mis-takes in the nurse-person process.
Australian Council for Safety and Quality in Health Care. (2002). Safety and Quality Council opportunities for funding. Retrieved November 11, 2002, from http://www.safetyandquality.org/
2.
Affonso, D.D. , & Doran, D. (2002). Cultivating discoveries in patient safety research: A framework. International Nursing Perspectives, 2(1), 33-47.
3.
Baker, G.R. , & Norton, P. (2001). Making patients safer! Reducing error in Canadian healthcare. Healthcare Papers, 2(1), 10-31.
4.
Bournes, D.A. (2002). Research evaluating human becoming in practice. Nursing Science Quarterly, 15, 190-195.
5.
Bournes, D.A. , & Parse, R.R. (2002, March). Feeling confident: A lived experience of human becoming. Paper presented at the 2002 Annual Research Conference of the Midwest Nursing Research Society, Chicago, IL.
6.
CBC News Online Staff. (2002, September 30). Canada needs to monitor, prevent medical errors: Committee. Retrieved November 4, 2002, from the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation Web site: www.cbc.ca/stories/2002/09/27/patient_safety020927
7.
Cody, W.K. (2001). “Mendacity” as the refusal to bear witness: A human becoming hermeneutic study of a theme from Tennessee Williams’ cat on a hot tin roof. In R.R. Parse, Qualitative inquiry: The path of sciencing (pp. 205-220). Sudbury, MA: Jones and Bartlett.
8.
Kohn, L.T. , Corrigan, J.M., & Donaldson, M.S. (2000). To err is human: Building a safer health system. Washington, DC: National Academy Press.
9.
National Patient Safety Agency. (2002). Retrieved December 2, 2002, from http://www.npsa.org.uk/
10.
National Steering Committee on Patient Safety . (2002). Building a safer system: A national strategy for improving patient safety in Canadian health care. Author.
11.
Nicklin, W. , & McVeety, J.E. (2002). Canadian nurses’ perceptions of patient safety in hospitals. Canadian Journal of Nursing Leadership, 15(3), 11-21.
12.
Parse, R.R. (1994). Quality of life: Sciencing and living the art of human becoming. Nursing Science Quarterly, 7, 16-21.
13.
Parse, R.R. (1996). Reality: A seamless symphony of becoming. Nursing Science Quarterly, 9, 181-183.
14.
Parse, R.R. (1998). The human becoming school of thought: A perspective for nurses and other health professionals. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
15.
Parse, R.R. (1999). Witnessing as true presence. Illuminations: Newsletter for the International Consortium of Parse Scholars, 8(3), 1.
