Contribution to a Mixed Assessment of Patient Safety Culture

Abstract Purpose: The evaluation of patient safety culture is conducted using quantitative methods based on the use of questionnaires and qualitative ones focused on the deployment of cultural maturity models. These methods are known to suffer from certain major limits. This article aims to overcome the difficulties encountered by both methods and to propose a novel approach to the assessment of PSC. Methodology: The approach proposed in this article consists of applying a combined method, based on Principal Component Analysis (PCA) and K-means algorithm, to group together PSC dimensions into macro-dimensions whose exploitation allows to overcome the difficulties encountered with dimensional analysis of PSC and then, serve as a basic support for the development of a patient safety culture maturity model. Findings: The results of the combined method PCA / k-means shows that PSC dimensions can be grouped into three macro-dimensions that were capitalized in a first place using factors related to the development of PSC and in a second place to develop a quantitative maturity matrix that helped in the identification of PSC maturity levels.Originality: The merit of our proposal is to work towards a quali-quantitative evaluation of safety culture recommended by a good number of researchers but, to our knowledge, few or no studies are devoted to this hybrid or systematic evaluation of safety culture. Thus, the results can also be projected to implicate PSC actors and to frame the evaluation pf PSC maturity by international standards.