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Objectives: Complexity of health care is progressively increasing and with that the number of medical errors and adverse events are increasing to an alarming level. The purpose of this study is to assess the perception of healthcare safety within the healthcare community and the general public and examine the association between the perception regarding healthcare safety and the prior exposure to medical errors. Methods: The study is a cross-sectional online survey. The online survey included basic demographics and a series of questions related to the knowledge and perception about healthcare safety and personal healthcare experience. Results: 504 respondent completed the survey. 78.6% were healthcare workers. 84% reported one or more exposure to medical errors or adverse events. Most respondents (81.5%) estimated the rate of medical errors to be 1:100 or less. only 29.3% of the respondents thought that medical errors are occurring more frequently than 10 years ago. 89.6% of the respondents thought that healthcare is a safe industry. Looking at Factors Predicting the Perception that Healthcare is Safe, there was no clear correlation with the exposure to medical errors except for surgical complications exposure (p-value=0.01, OR 21.4) Conclusions: There is a strong indication in our data that healthcare workers and public perception is far from the reality of the dangers of the healthcare system There is a need to educate the public regarding the medical error rate and the healthcare safety to help make patients and their families become partners in their care and to help healthcare workers better understand the limitations of healthcare processes that may affect patient safety and outcomes.

Background : Diabetes is one of the most common diagnoses encountered in hospitalized patients. In-hospital hyperglycemia is considered an independent marker of in-hospital poor outcome even in those without prior diagnosis of Diabetes. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the impact of introducing inpatient diabetes management protocol at Madinat Zayed hospital, a rural secondary care hospital in the Western region of Abu Dhabi, UAE. Methods : Adult, non-pregnant Patients admitted to the hospital with diabetes or a blood glucose >7.8 mmol/l (140 mg/dl) were included. The protocol guided physicians to start weight based insulin regimen for all patients with type 1diabetes, insulin dependent type 2 diabetes and all hyperglycemic patients regardless of history of diabetes. All patients who required insulin therapy were treated with basal and bolus insulin. A historical control was randomly selected for comparison. Results : 101 patients were identified in the intervention group and 69 patients in the historical control group. The mean glucose level in the treatment group was 9.2 ±3.1 mmol/l (165.6 ±55.8 mg/dl) and 12.4± 2.7 mmol/l (223±48.6 mg/dl) in the historical control group with a reduction of 26% in the mean glucose level (P 16.6 mmol/l or 300 mg/dl) was significantly lower in the interventional group (23% versus 66%) with p value

Objective: The purpose of this study was to examine the prevalence of the metabolic syndrome and its individual components among multiethnic population in a rural area in the Western region of Abu Dhabi in The United Arab Emirates (UAE). Methods: The analytic sample consisted of 575 adults (males: 309, females: 266), between the age of 22 and 65 years. The National Cholesterol Education Program’s Adult Treatment Panel III (NCEP/ATP III) guidelines (with race specific abdominal circumference cutoff level) were used to identify adults who met their criteria for metabolic syndrome with. Prevalence estimates were calculated for each component of the metabolic syndrome in addition to the overall prevalence of metabolic syndrome. Prevalence estimates were analyzed by sex, ethnicity and working hours. Results: Approximately 22% of adults met the criteria for metabolic syndrome. The prevalence was 26% in Males and 14% in females, P. Value