Hospital Survey on Patient Safety Culture

In 2004, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) released the Hospital Survey on Patient Safety Culture for providers and other staff to assess the patient safety culture in their hospitals. Since then, hundreds of hospitals across the United States and internationally have implemented the survey.

Hospital Survey Toolkit

Survey Form

Hospital Survey—English (PDF, 327 KB; MS Word, 187 KB).
Facility version: Replaces the term "hospital" with "facility" (PDF, 301 KB; MS Word, 154 KB).
Hospital Survey—Spanish (PDF, 152 KB; MS Word, 116 KB).

Survey Items and Composite Measures

Hospital Survey Items and Composites—English (PDF, 149 KB).
Hospital Survey Items and Composites—Spanish and Description of Translation Process (PDF 241 KB).

Supplemental Items

Learn more about SOPS-approved supplemental item sets for the Hospital Survey.

Survey User's Guide

The User's Guide discusses issues and major decisions involved in conducting a survey and reporting the results. The Guide includes information on getting started, selecting a sample, determining data collection methods, establishing data collection procedures, conducting a Web-based survey, and preparing and analyzing data, and producing reports.

Survey User's Guide (PDF, 1.4 MB).

Additional Resources

Frequently Asked Questions

Action Planning Tool (PDF File, 368.7 KB; Word, 111.77 KB)

The Action Planning Tool assists users of the AHRQ Surveys on Patient Safety Culture to develop an action plan for improving patient safety culture in their organizations.

Research Reference List

This research reference list provides citations for published articles using AHRQ safety culture surveys. It includes references on the use of the surveys; psychometric analyses; analyses linking the survey to outcome data; reviews of instruments; and international studies.

Using Just Culture To Improve Hospital Survey on Patient Safety Culture Results (Webcast)

This Webcast provides strategies used to implement Just Culture in a health care system and how these led to improved results on the survey.

Update on Version 2.0 of the Hospital Survey on Patient Safety Culture

AHRQ is conducting a pilot test of the revised Hospital Survey on Patient Safety Culture.
Read more

Resource List

Improving Patient Safety in Hospitals: A Resource List for Users of the AHRQ Hospital Survey on Patient Safety Culture (PDF, 936 KB)
This document contains links to practical resources to improve patient safety culture and patient safety in hospitals.

Data Entry and Analysis Tool
This tool uses Microsoft® Excel® to assist with entering survey data. The tool then creates tables and graphs to display survey results.

To request the tool, send an email to:
DatabasesOnSafetyCulture
@westat.com

Technical Assistance

SafetyCultureSurveys
@westat.com
1-888-324-9749.

DatabasesOnSafetyCulture
@westat.com
1-888-324-9790

Page last reviewed August 2018
Page originally created July 2013

Internet Citation: Hospital Survey on Patient Safety Culture. Content last reviewed August 2018. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, Rockville, MD. http://www.ahrq.gov/sops/quality-patient-safety/patientsafetyculture/hospital/index.html