Cover Memo

SUBMISSION OF INFORMATION COLLECTION UNDER THE

Request for Approval under AHRQ’s Generic Clearance “Questionnaire and Data Collection Testing, Evaluation, and Research for the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality” (OMB Control Number: 0935-0124)

DATE OF REQUEST: August 19, 2020

SUB AGENCY (I/C): HHS/AHRQ

TITLE: Pilot Test of the Proposed Workforce Safety Supplemental Item Set

For the Surveys on Patient Safety Culture

GENERIC CLEARANCE UNDER OMB#: 0935-0124 EXP. DATE: 11/30/2020

ABSTRACT: While the safety of the healthcare workforce has been a longstanding concern and is a core component of the NSC’s efforts, the recent emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic in early 2020 has brought the issue of healthcare workforce safety even more to the forefront around the world. Shortages of proper personal protective equipment (PPE) have made healthcare workers more vulnerable to exposure to the virus. In addition, the physical and psychological well-being of healthcare workers is being tested as patient loads have increased and co-workers become infected with COVID-19, contributing significantly to burnout and a decline in the mental health of the healthcare workforce.ⁱ

Given the foundational importance of workforce safety as a precondition for patient safety, and renewed attention on the criticality of workforce safety as a result of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, AHRQ is undertaking timely work to develop survey items that will help healthcare organizations identify and improve workforce safety. The workforce safety survey items will assess the extent to which the organization’s culture supports workforce safety. The items will be developed as a new supplemental item set that can optionally be administered at the end of the AHRQ Surveys on Patient Safety Culture™ (SOPS^®). By developing a supplemental item set, AHRQ will build this new measure of workforce safety upon its existing and highly successful SOPS survey program. SOPS surveys are completed by providers, staff, and administrators within healthcare organizations to assess the extent to which their organizational culture supports patient safety. There are SOPS surveys for hospitals, medical offices, nursing homes, ambulatory surgery centers, and community pharmacies. There are also supplemental items on health information technology patient safety and value and efficiency, with an item set on diagnostic safety currently under development.

Similar to work on previous SOPS survey supplemental item sets, our goal will be to develop a reliable, public-use item set that is limited in scope so it can be used in conjunction with one of the SOPS surveys, or used as a stand-alone supplemental item set. The goal is to develop 12 to15 items across 3 or 4 composite measures rather than developing a full-length survey.

The supplemental item set will be used by healthcare organizations to enable them to assess the organizational culture factors that contribute to workforce safety, and help them identify strengths and areas for improvement to efficiently target resources to improve workforce safety.

Most existing surveys on workforce safety focus on organizational, management, and provider and staff compliance with regulations, and are more like safety checklists. There is currently a void of validated survey items focusing on provider and staff perspectives about aspects of organizational culture that facilitate workforce safety. We have been unable to find instruments that address multiple, relevant areas of workforce safety for use in a variety of healthcare settings, with a variety of respondents, in one, brief instrument, which are the objectives of this research.

TOTAL ANNUAL BURDEN APPROVED: 8900 Hours Per year

BURDEN USED TO DATE: 165 hours.

BURDEN THIS REQUEST: 1935 hours.

FEDERAL COST: The estimated annual cost to the Federal government is $300,000__.

IS RACE AND ETHNICITY DATA COLLECTED AS REQUIRED?

______YES ______ NO _____x_ N/A

OBLIGATION TO RESPOND:

___x__VOLUNTARY

______ REQUIRED TO OBTAIN OR RETAIN BENEFITS

______ MANDATORY

HOW WILL THIS SURVEY BE OFFERED?

__X____ WEB SITE

__ _ TELEPHONE INTERVIEW

__ ___ MAIL RESPONSE [email]

____ IN PERSON INTERVIEW

_____ OTHER: ___________________________________

CONTACT INFORMATION:

NAME: _Caren Ginsberg________________________________________

TELEPHONE NUMBER: _ (301) 427-1894_____________________

EMAIL ADDRESS: Marie. [email protected] _________________________

i Ehrlich, H., McKenney, M., & Elkbuli, A. (2020). Protecting our healthcare workers during the COVID-19 pandemic. The American Journal of Emergency Medicine, 38(7), 1527–1528 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ajem.2020.04.024)