Over the past few years, the University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf (UKE) has established a comprehensive Clinical Risk Management (CRM). The CRM includes all clinical and administrative activities that identify, assess, and reduce the risks of harm for the organization. The objective of the CRM is to improve the quality of the medical treatment and patient safety. Its legal basis consists of of the Joint Federal Committee for the Basic Requirements on an Internal Quality Management guidelines.

The CRM does not have to be reinvented for physicians and the nursing staff because it is an integral part of their daily work. In patient care, there is a series of very well-established tools for the CRM (for example, visits and interdisciplinary case conferences). They are supplemented by modern methods such as Critical Incident Reporting, risk audits and simulation techniques. An effective CRM must be integrated into the continual improvement process of the “learning organization” and thus into quality management.