A Digital Safety Detection and Control System for Proactive Risk Management

Patient safety remains a defining dimension of health care quality, yet systems rely on retrospective assessment after harm has occurred, limiting visibility into upstream risks, including process failures and near misses. This challenge underscores the need for an approach that unifies fragmented safety activities to support proactive safety risk management. We describe a phased pilot implementation and evaluation framework of a Digital Safety Detection and Control System (DSDC) within a large integrated health care system to operationalize enterprise-wide patient safety. The DSDC integrates governance, human oversight, and digital capabilities across 4 operational phases: detection, triage, investigation, and learning. These capabilities support earlier risk identification, standardized prioritization, coordinated investigation, timely corrective action, and continuous learning across the safety lifecycle. By embedding measurement and human oversight into its design, the DSDC is intended to provide a proactive, reliable, and accountable framework that supports earlier intervention and reduces preventable harm.