Patient safety walk rounds : views of frontline staff members and managers in Sweden

Background: Leadership Walk Rounds (WRs) have been described as a promising intervention to achieve a culture of safety by means of engaging leaders at different levels in patient safety issues. The aim was to investigate WRs carried out in a Swedish county council in terms of advantages, disadvantages and opportunities for improvement, as perceived by the participating frontline staff members, local unit managers and top-level managers.Methods: A cross-sectional study of 19 WRs. Responses from questionnaireswere analysed using qualitative and quantitative methods. Content analysis was used to categorize the findings from open-ended questions regarding advantages, disadvantages and suggestions for improvement.Results: The response rate was 95%. The participants in the WRs were generally very positive about the intervention. They believed that the intervention had several advantages and that WRs could have an impact on patient safety. Few differences between the three personnel categories were found.Conclusions: A WR developed on the basis of descriptions in the literature was perceived to have many advantages according to frontline staff members, local managers and top-level managers who participated in the intervention. WRs are perceived to contribute to increased learning concerning patient safety and to influence the patient safety culture. The overall positive findings are broadly consistent with the predominantly optimistic reports of WRs in the patient safety literature. However, further research is needed to investigate how the potential of the WR can be realized, including evaluationsof the effectiveness of the intervention in terms of various patient safety outcomes.