Involving and actively participating patients in care has led to improved (perceived) quality of care, new perspectives, transparency, and more openness. This likely counts for learning from complications.
The morbidity and mortality meeting (M&MM) is organized in all surgical departments. To improve the meeting, the department of gynaecological oncology changed the format and invited patients (and relatives) when their complication was discussed. This thesis shows positive experiences of patient participation at the M&MM for both patients and healthcare professionals. Besides leading to more openness, and improved (emotional) processing, this new approach led to different learning points and improved the implementation of learning points from the meeting. However, patient participation takes time, and it is a learning process for healthcare professionals. It is therefore important for healthcare professionals to experience a M&MM with patients more than once. Any department can start involving patients at the M&MM, but full support of the team and at the management level is necessary.
Britt Myren (1988) obtained her Master’s degree in Medical Anthropology and Sociology at the University of Amsterdam in 2012 after which she worked as a researcher. In 2018 she started her PhD research at the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology of Radboudumc and the RIHS. She now works as a senior researcher at Atria institute on gender equality and women’s history.