System Dynamics Models To Support Health Care Companies In Managing Clinical Risk

Abstract

Clinical risk management has gained an increasing relevance because of the higher monetary and no monetary effects of clinical errors on health care companies' performance. For this reason, different risk management techniques from the industrial sector have been adopted by managers of health care companies in order to reduce the occurrences of errors and their relative impacts. However, these methods, based on a linear and static perspective, do not properly support the health care companies' management in the identification and assessment of policies aimed at improving the clinical risk profile without reducing financial performances. Therefore, it is necessary to adopt a systemic and multi-dimensional approach that supports cost-and-benefit analysis of the identified policies. The article aims at describing the background and the logical premises of a research project on system dynamics methodology applied to clinical risk management in Italian health care companies.