State statutes protect incident and occurrence reports prepared for quality improvement purposes. Scope varies, and reports prepared in the ordinary course or shared beyond the quality function may lose protection.
The federal Patient Safety Act provides a separate framework.
Alternative Names:
Incident Report Protection, Occurrence Report Privilege
Why it Matters?
Protection frequently fails where reports serve dual purposes, since a document also used for risk management, insurance reporting, or operational review may fall outside a quality improvement privilege. How the facility routes and uses these reports determines whether the privilege holds, which makes the process documentation as important as the statute. Underlying factual information generally remains discoverable through other sources regardless.
Frequently Confused with
Related terms
Frequently asked questions
Why does the privilege frequently fail?
Does the privilege protect the underlying facts?
