Anesthesia-related perioperative patient safety services in Indian public and private hospitals with or without teaching programs: A matched analysis of qualitative survey data

Introduction: The World Health Organization is emphasizing global patient safety for more than a decade. However, very less is known about the patient safety environment in the perioperative settings in developing countries. The present secondary analysis aimed to compare the anesthesia-related patient safety measures and services in Indian public versus private and teaching versus nonteaching hospitals. Materials and Methods: The present study is a post hoc, subgroup analysis of a previously conducted cross-sectional, questionnaire-based, online survey during February-May 2019. Responses from the postgraduate trainee and consultant/qualified practitioners were included. Data related to the practice pattern and availability of standard, advanced monitoring, and equipment were then categorized based on the hospital funding source and availability of teaching program; compared using the Fisher's exact test, and P < 0.05 was considered statistically significant. Results: Six hundred responses were included. The majority (60.7%) were from the private sector; 57.3% worked in teaching hospitals. Overall, anesthesia-related patient safety and equipment were deficient across the entire range of hospitals. However, there was no difference between matched public and private hospitals (P > 0.05 for most), except the anonymous incident reporting, which was significantly higher in the corporate teaching hospitals (P < 0.0001). Teaching hospitals had significantly better safety measures (P < 0.0001 for most parameters) than nonteaching hospitals. Conclusion: Public sector hospitals in India are not having significantly different anesthesia services related to patient safety monitoring and equipment than private sector hospitals. However, the safety measures are relatively low in many aspects across all sectors, which need attention.