Evaluation of an intervention aimed at improving voluntary incident reporting in hospitals

Objectives: To assess the effectiveness of an intervention package comprising intense education, a range of reporting options, changes in report management and enhanced feedback, in order to improve incident-reporting rates and change the types of incidents reported. Design, setting and participants: Non-equivalent group controlled clinical trial involving medical and nursing staff working in 10 intervention and 10 control units in four major cities and two regional hospitals in South Australia. Main outcome measures: Comparison of reporting rates by type of unit, profession, location of hospital, type of incident reported and reporting mechanism between baseline and study periods in control and intervention units. Results: The intervention resulted in significant improvement in reporting in inpatient areas (additional 60.3 reports/10 000 occupied bed days (OBDs); 95% CI 23.8 to 96.8, p