Tehran – World Patient Safety Day aims to raise public awareness to improve patient safety. This year’s slogan, “Patient Safety from the First Time!”, highlights the urgent need to act early and consistently to prevent harm throughout childhood and benefit throughout your life course.
Solution 72.6, “Global Actions on Patient Safety,” recognizes patient safety as a global health priority and supports the establishment of a global patient safety day observed annually on September 17th.
Every child is entitled to safe and quality healthcare from the start. However, newborns and young children face higher risks due to rapid development, evolving health needs and various disease patterns. They rely on adults to speak up and make decisions for them. Children may also face additional challenges depending on their socioeconomic situation, such as inability to obtain the care they need. These factors make them vulnerable to harm if care is not specifically adapted to age, size, health and context.
A single safety incident can have lifelong consequences on the health and development of a child. Therefore, the 2025 World Patient Safe Day is dedicated to ensuring safe care for newborn children, with a special focus on people from birth to nine years old.
Under the slogan “Patient Safety from the First Time!”, the World Health Organization (WHO) calls for urgent action to eliminate avoidable harm in pediatric and neonatal care. Addressing this challenge requires comprehensive efforts in key patient safety areas, including safe childbirth and postnatal care, medication safety, diagnostic safety, vaccination safety, infection prevention, and early recognition of clinical degradation. World Patient Safety Day 2025 aims to promote meaningful improvement and reaffirm all children’s rights to safe and quality care.
As part of our global efforts to achieve Sustainable Development Goal 3, we are calling for parents, caregivers, healthcare workers, healthcare workers, educators and communities to unite in action and build a safer and healthier future for all children.
The main objectives of the 2025 World Patient Safety Day are as follows:
1. Raise global awareness of safety risks in pediatric and neonatal care in all healthcare settings, highlighting the specific needs of children, families and caregivers.
2. As part of patient safety and quality initiatives, we mobilize governments, healthcare agencies, specialized agencies and civil society to implement sustainable strategies for safer care for newborns and children.
3. Empower parents, caregivers and children to patient safety by promoting education, awareness and active participation in active care.
4. We advocate for strengthening research into patient safety in pediatric and neonatal care.
The Global Patient Safety Action Plan 2021-2030 recognizes pediatric and neonatal safety across multiple strategic objectives, including designing safe clinical processes, strengthening the capacity of a healthy workforce, patient and family engagement, and establishing learning systems to prevent harm. It also seeks patient safety education, including a dedicated curriculum for older children, and is equipped with essential knowledge of safety principles and self-advocacy in health care.