Run time: January-June 2018
Client: Health and Youth Inspectorate (Netherlands)
Project description
Soft signals, that is, those signals that are hard to grasp and capture in quantified metrics – e.g. fear to speak up, communication problems, disputes between colleagues – are increasingly recognized as important indicators for fallibilities in healthcare organizations. In the medical sociological literature on patient safety, soft signals are related to the problem of clinical errors, and how instruments of soft intelligence (i.e. processes and behaviors associated with seeking and interpreting soft data) may tackle treats to patient safety. In this research, we turn to the Inspectorate, examining how and to what extend the Inspectorate mobilizes soft signals in its supervision practices. Based on interviews, observations and document analysis, we sketch the ways in which inspectors collect and processes soft signals in their everyday work, and how they seek to transform soft signals in ‘hard’ findings that stand standards of supervision. Furthermore, we elucidate the role soft signals play in relationships of dis/trust between the Inspectorate and healthcare organizations, and how this frames patient safety policies, both among the Inspectorate and healthcare organizations.
Team
Josje Kok (PhD candidate), Iris Wallenburg, Roland Bal
Publications
- Final report: Omgaan met soft signals in het toezicht (2019, Dutch). Iris Wallenburg, Josje Kok & Roland Bal, Rotterdam: ESHPM.