Using a sentinel adverse incident audit on a Medicine for the Elderly ward

Adverse events in healthcare occur more often in older people,1,2 and older people are more vulnerable to the effects of adverse events. Despite this, there are few studies that focus specifically on reducing adverse events in older people.3 Several problems have been noted with systems such as the incident reporting (IR1) system used in the National Health Service—lack of anonymity,4 failure of medical staff to fill in reports, bias towards certain types of events (eg, falls) and lack of feedback to ward staff. …