Chief Patient Safety Officer at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center

Edward G. Seferian

Edward G. Seferian, MD, is the Chief Patient Safety Officer at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. He is also paediatric intensivist specializing in caring for critically ill and injured infants and children. His areas of expertise include pediatrics, critical care medicine, hospital quality and patient safety. Dr.Seferian’s outcome research evaluates healthcare utilization and costs related to intensive care and healthcare quality and safety.

How would you describe your journey with Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, and what are your key responsibilities here?

I am the Chief Patient Safety Officer responsible for leading the organization’s patient safety program.  Our mission includes proactively identifying and eliminating latent defects in the processes of care that can pose a threat to patient safety. We identify the root causes of adverse events and implement and sustain actions to prevent repeat events—enhancing a safety culture that encourages all staff to feel safe speaking up when they identify a potential safety issue, particularly “near miss” events that haven’t reached a patient.

What were some of the significant challenges in patient safety during the pandemic?

The COVID-19 pandemic affected hospitals in different ways. Like many other large medical centers, we experienced a significant surge of patients with COVID-19, necessitating expedited adaption of clinical and operational processes to care for patients while keeping our staff safe. Many of these new and innovative processes remainin place.

Are there any trends that emerged recently in patient safety?

Like organizations in other industries, hospitals are utilizing data to understand opportunities and drive change. This is essential for continuous quality improvement.  Connecting the dots from safety data across the healthcare continuum can lead to a deeper understanding of where things can go wrong.  We created a visual and interactive safety dashboard from our incident reporting system for more real-time identification of safety issues and trends.

“Ensuring the safest patient care requires a robust safety culture that engages all staff, clinical and non-clinical” 

We are also conducting a federally-funded research project on waysto better engage front-line staff with reporting safety issues, particularly near-miss events.  The Safety Action Feedback and Engagement (SAFE) Loop is designed to improve the quality and quantity of incident reports tomake information more actionable, including human factors that may have contributed to a safety event. 

Where do you envision Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in two years with all the potential disruptions and transformations in patient safety?

Technology will have an increasingrole supporting staff in making patient care even safer.Technology should complement but not replace essential best practices, whether barcoding for medication or blood administration or clinical decision supportin the electronic medical record.  One ongoing challenge is ensuring that the increasing availability ofpatient monitoring devices not only to alert staff of physiologic derangements but to prevent adverse events such as falls does not exacerbate alarm and alert fatigue experienced by staff. Maintaining a multidisciplinary robust alarm management program with front-line staff engagement will become increasingly essential.  Finally, artificial intelligence may become a valuable tool to proactive identify patients at increased risk of an adverse event, allowing for adjustments in care plans to enhance safety. 

In light of your experience, what will be your advice to peers and leaders in the industry?

Patient safety leaders need to be visible on hospital units to better understand barriers or issues frontline staff may be experiencing to providethe safest patient care.  When staff raises issues, leaders need to ensure that they address concerns and provide appropriate follow-up back to staff.