16 August 2023 – The World Health Organization (WHO), in collaboration with the Ministry of Health and Medical Education of the Islamic Republic of Iran, held training-of-trainers courses on patient safety-friendly frameworks to develop the capacity of health care professionals to implement these frameworks in the country.

Dr Jaffar Hussain, WHO Representative in the Islamic Republic of Iran, inaugurated each course in the presence of officials from the Ministry and the National Institute for Health Research.

During the first course, participants, including focal persons for patient safety from 31 universities of medical sciences and selected hospitals, were introduced to WHO’s third edition of the Patient Safety–Friendly Hospital Framework. The second course, on 18–20 July, was aimed at focal persons for health management network and patient safety from 20 universities of medical sciences in 10 provinces and selected associates from the Ministry of Health and Medical Education, who were introduced to the first edition of the Patient Safety–Friendly Primary Care Framework.

In a side event, the Farsi translation of WHO’s Patient Safety Friendly Primary Care Framework was launched. The event was attended by the Deputy Minister of Health for Public Health, Director-General of the Health Management Network Center, President of the National Institute for Health Research, President of the Institute for Future Studies in Health, and WHO staff from the Regional Office and country offices.

Also, the WHO team met with Dr Karimi, Deputy Minister of Health for Curative Affairs, to discuss future programmes to promote patient safety in the health system. The Deputy Minister requested WHO to continue supporting hospitals in the country in full adoption of the latest edition of the Framework. He also expressed the Ministry’s interest in and commitment to fully implementing the "WHO Global Patient Safety Action Plan 2021–2030". The parties then discussed the creation of an intersectoral committee to develop a road map.

Other items discussed in the meeting included the rollout of patient safety in the 64 universities of medical sciences, the training of trainers for national surveyors, and the incorporation of WHO multi-profession patient safety curriculum in the curricula of health and medical disciplines. Acknowledging the country’s continuous efforts to adopt patient safety interventions and programmes, the WHO team reiterated the Organization’s commitment to supporting the country throughout this journey.

The courses, from 15 to 20 July, incorporated 2 days of class activities and 1 day of hands-on training, during which the participants visited selected comprehensive health care centres and hospitals to assess them against the latest patient safety standards put forth in the frameworks. This training will be cascaded to relevant health professionals at hospitals and to health workforce at primary health care in the catchment areas of the universities of medical sciences by the participants of this workshop.