The Hospital Authority's new policy of openness and transparency to improve the quality of its service is a laudable step. With Hong Kong's rise as a destination for mainland patients, the move should serve as an example for the private sector to follow.
Given the spate of serious medical mishaps in public hospitals in recent months, a better approach to the way in which such incidents were dealt with was clearly needed. That some had been leaked to the media by relatives was inevitable in light of their nature - one, involving a young cancer patient who died, was the subject of an international alert by the World Health Organisation warning about the procedure used.
Keeping such matters quiet through not distinguishing their seriousness or having a time frame for acknowledgment, as had been the authority's practice, does not make for better medicine. Lessons can only be learned from mistakes.
The rigid reporting procedures announced yesterday go firmly in that direction. Naming, shaming and blaming is not the objective, nor is it because of flaws in the system - public health care in Hong Kong remains among the best in the world. Rather, it is to ensure that all incidents, no matter whether minor or serious, are quickly recorded and made known so that all with a stake in our health system can strive to make it of the highest possible quality.
Under the three-step approach being adopted on October 1, mistakes will be openly reported, why they happened analysed and the lesson learned taken on board in all hospitals. As the authority's chief executive, Shane Solomon, says, the most difficult part will be building a culture where mistakes are openly admitted.
Mistakes are part of human nature, even for highly trained medical staff. As hard as it may be for them to admit blame, they have to accept that doing so when they have erred is in the interests of the entire medical system.
