Green Cross method in a postanaesthesia care unit: a qualitative study of the healthcare professionals’ experiences after 3 years, including the COVID-19 pandemic period

OBJECTIVES: Unsafe medical care causes morbidity and mortality among the hospital patients. In a postanaesthesia care unit (PACU), increasing patient safety is a joint effort between different professions. The Green Cross (GC) method is a user-friendly incident reporting method that incorporates daily safety briefings to support healthcare professionals in their daily patient safety work. Thus, this study aimed to describe healthcare professionals’ experiences with the GC method in a PACU setting 3 years after its implementation, including the period of the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic’s three waves. DESIGN: An inductive, descriptive qualitative study was conducted. The data were analysed using qualitative content analysis. SETTING: The study was conducted at a PACU of a university hospital in South-Eastern Norway. PARTICIPANTS: Five semistructured focus group interviews were conducted in March and April 2022. The informants (n=23) were PACU nurses (n=18) and collaborative healthcare professionals (n=5) including physicians, nurses and a pharmacist. RESULTS: The theme ‘still active, but in need of revitalisation’ was created, describing the healthcare professionals’ experiences with the GC method, 3 years post implementation. The following five categories were found: ‘continuing to facilitate open communication’, ‘expressing a desire for more interprofessional collaboration regarding improvements’, ‘increasing reluctance to report’, ‘downscaling due to the pandemic’ and ‘expressing a desire to share more of what went well’. CONCLUSIONS: This study offers information regarding the healthcare professionals’ experiences with the GC method in a PACU setting; further, it deepens the understanding of the daily patient safety work using this incident reporting method.