Event Overview

During this session you will be introduced to 3 safety-netting advice tools to help improve the content and delivery of your consultations to improve patient outcomes.

Learning outcomes

  • Understand why diagnostic uncertainty is inevitable in primary care consultations
  • Understand the use of the “6-C’s” safety-netting decision-making tool
  • Understand the use of the “SAFER” safety-netting content tool
  • Understand the use of “SBART” as a tool to improve the delivery of safety-netting advice

SAFER Consulting: How to manage diagnostic uncertainty & reduce diagnostic errors in your consultations

Consultations often end with us being uncertain about the diagnosis, or whether the patient will develop a serious complication of what is usually a minor illness. Knowing how to manage this safely is essential to protect both patients and those who care for them from harm. In addition, studies have shown that around 1-in-10 diagnoses in primary care are incorrect and that this results in serious harm to patients in 1-in-1000 consultations. When these events occur, they cause heartache and complaints for GP’s and concerns about making a mistake contributes to stress and burn-out. These sessions will help you to understand the causes of diagnostic uncertainty and errors during consultations and what you can do to manage these risks more safely.

Session 1: Managing diagnostic uncertainty safely with safety-netting advice

Many consultations end with us not being certain of the diagnosis, or with the potential for a patient to develop a serious complication of an illness later. Our usual response to this is to tell the patient to come back if things get worse, known as safety-netting advice. This session will explain why so many of our diagnoses are uncertain and what we can do to improve patient outcomes through improving the quality of the safety-netting advice that we give our patients. During the session, you will be introduced to 3 safety-netting advice tools that you can use to help you improve the content and delivery of your safety-netting advice.

Webinar Chair

Dr Emma Salik, GP, Faculty Education Lead, RCGP Beds and Herts

Webinar Speaker:

Dr Paul Silverston, Visiting Professor at Anglia Ruskin University & Visiting Professor of Primary Care at The University of Suffolk

Prices

AiT – £50
Member – £75
Non-member – £100

Delegates must sign up to the three sessions separately (Tuesday 1 October, Wednesday 6 November 2024 and Thursday 5 December 2024) to complete the course, however each part can be undertaken as a stand alone session.

Safer consulting | part 2: Reducing diagnostic errors through the use of accident prevention plans, Wednesday 6 November 2024 Sign up here

Safer consulting | part 3: SAFER Consulting in Babies, Children & Older Patients, Thursday 5 December 2024 Sign up here