From HRO to HERO: Making Health Equity a Core System Capability.

Moy E, Hausmann LRM, Clancy CM. From HRO to HERO: Making Health Equity a Core System Capability. American journal of medical quality : the official journal of the American College of Medical Quality. 2022 Jan 1; 37(1):81-83.

As many health systems have been working to become high-reliability organizations (HROs), health equity has been largely absent from discussions and applications of HRO principles. This is a serious oversight. Disparities in health and health care represent systematic failures to achieve reliable outcomes for certain groups. Acceptance of disparities is antithetical to the essential HRO goal of "zero harm." We propose adding Equity to HROs in the most literal sense by designating it as a key component and achieving High Equity Reliability Organizations. We describe how equity should be a crucial element of all 5 HRO core concepts: sensitivity to operations, preoccupation with failure, deference to expertise, resilience, and reluctance to simplify.