Built on trust: Patient safety starts with trustworthy results

Annika Eriksson
Senior Specialist, Clinical & Scientific Affairs

Current as of 2026

Every year on September 17, World Patient Safety Day brings patients, healthcare professionals and policymakers together around a shared goal: improving patient safety worldwide.

Established at the 72nd World Health Assembly in 2019, this day serves as an important reminder that safe care is a fundamental priority across all health systems.

Patient safety is often associated with prevention of accidental and avoidable harm to patients. Yet every safe decision begins long before treatment is initiated; it starts with reliable information. Healthcare professionals depend on timely and accurate results to make informed decisions, act with confidence and deliver the right care at the right time.

In addition, trustworthy diagnostic information can be far more than a convenience. It can help reduce uncertainty, support confident decision-making and enable timely intervention when every moment matters.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), approximately 70% of healthcare decisions are made based on diagnostic test results. This figure highlights the important role diagnostics play in supporting clinical decision-making.

Annika Eriksson
Senior Specialist, Clinical & Scientific Affairs at HemoCue

“When we hear about patient safety, we often focus on what happens after a decision is made. But every clinical decision starts with information, and timely and reliable diagnostics are fundamental in reducing uncertainty and supporting safe, confident decision-making.”

Point-of-care testing (POCT) as an alternative to laboratory-based testing, offers opportunities for rapid, accessible, and patient-centric care, and trust in POCT is built through consistent, validated performance.

Across multiple studies, HemoCue^® Hemoglobin Systems have demonstrated excellent agreement with internationally recognized laboratory reference methods, helping healthcare professionals rely on results wherever care is delivered.

However, performance alone does not guarantee widespread adoption. Even when reliable POCT is available, healthcare organizations may continue to rely on centralized laboratory testing. Reasons for this could be resistance to change of workflows, fear of overuse and doubt in cost effectiveness.

In contrast, institutions that have effectively integrated POCT show that when employed in the right context and oversight, it can lead to improved clinical and economic outcomes, and the benefits have been shown to outweigh the risks.

Annika Eriksson
Senior Specialist, Clinical & Scientific Affairs at HemoCue

“In many care settings, decisions need to be made quickly. Having access to quick results at the point of care can help healthcare professionals take timely action, and accurate results will help maintain the quality standards they depend on. That’s why both accuracy and reliability are so important.”

HemoCue solutions deliver lab-quality results at the point of care within minutes, or even seconds, enabling healthcare professionals to make timely decisions without compromising accuracy. Built on decades of expertise and trusted by healthcare providers around the world, HemoCue systems are designed to perform consistently across a wide range of care settings, helping support informed decision-making wherever care happens.

Because when healthcare professionals can trust the result, they can focus on what matters most: delivering safe, effective care and better outcomes for every patient.