Designing a Curriculum for the Disclosure of Medical Errors: A Requirement for a Positive Patient Safety Culture

The Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) has endorsed the disclosure of adverse treatment events as a common program requirement for resident education and experience since July 2019. This article explores the residents' current attitudes and knowledge in the disclosure of medical errors and the efforts to design a more specific and effective educational program. We conducted a cross-sectional survey of medical residents toward this end. We observed that 62.5% of the residents were not familiar with the error-reporting process at our institution. General concerns about disclosing errors are related primarily to negative patient reactions (66.7%). The majority (58.3%) of the trainees' negative psychological experience after an unanticipated outcome resulting in harm has caused increased anxiety about future errors. To ensure a positive error-disclosure culture, the curriculum must include efforts to educate trainees on the error-reporting system and the disclosure process and should create an opportunity for the organization to establish programs and policies to guide practitioners through the process of disclosures.