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The Importance and Value of the Checklist

Checklists can be used to dramatically reduce errors and increase discipline to achieve consistently high-quality products and services. By providing a clear and consistent framework for carrying out tasks, checklists can improve accuracy, increase efficiency, and reduce the risk of mistakes or oversights.

Checklists can be used to dramatically reduce errors and increase discipline in an organisation.

Human failure is from:
1. Ignorance: You don’t know what you don’t know.
2. Ineptitude: Where knowledge is applied inconsistently or incorrectly.

In a complex environment, common failure is the result of:
1. Fallibility of human memory and attention - especially tasks which are considered mundane and routine.
2. Skipping steps because they don't always matter... until they do.

Checklists can help with memory recall and clearly set out minimum steps necessary in a process. Good checklists are explicit. They offer the possibility of verification but also instill the discipline of higher performance. Implementing checklists can also be a behavior change vehicle.

​Dr Atul Gawande speaks about how a simple checklist reduced complication rates in surgery by 35%, death rates by 47% and saved the health industry hundreds of millions of dollars.

By introducing a checklist into the surgical process, he was able to reduce infection and death rates drastically. This improvement in outcomes was achieved through a series of simple and easy-to-follow steps, including hand hygiene, using sterile drapes, and wearing masks and gowns. By implementing a checklist for these procedures, all members of the surgical team were able to follow the same process, reducing the risk of error or oversight.

The checklist was simple and mostly included common-sense steps, however, if one of these surgical checklists steps were missed, it increased the patient’s risk of infection, longer hospital stays, and even death.

Dr. Gawande’s study highlights the potential benefits of using checklists in a wide range of industries and applications. By providing a clear and consistent framework for carrying out complex tasks, checklists can improve accuracy, increase efficiency, and reduce the risk of mistakes or oversights.

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