Joint Commission updates sentinel events through 2015

Editor's Note

The Joint Commission on March 2 issued an update of its sentinel event statistics through the end of 2015.

Of the 936 sentinel events reviewed, the most frequently reported was unintended retention of a foreign body at 116 events, followed by wrong-patient, wrong-site, or wrong-procedure at 111. Operative/postoperative complications were sixth in the top 10 sentinel events at 76.

The top 10 most frequently identified root causes for sentinel events included human factors (eg, staff supervision issues) at 999 and leadership (eg, organizational planning) at 849. Operative care was eighth in the list at 62.

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