According to WHO, Patient Safety is the absence of preventable harm to a patient during the process of health care and reduction of risk of unnecessary harm associated with health care to an acceptable minimum. An acceptable minimum refers to the collective notions of given current knowledge, resources available and the context in which care was delivered weighed against the risk of non-treatment or other treatment.

The European Charter of Patients' Rights was drafted in 2002 by Active Citizenship Network in collaboration with 12 citizens' organizations from different EU countries. The European Charter of Patients' Rights states 14 patients' rights that together aim to guarantee a “high level of human health protection” (Article 35 of the Charter of fundamental rights of the European Union) and to assure the high quality of services provided by the various national health services in Europe.

​

The 14 rights are an embodiment of fundamental rights and, as such, they must be recognised and respected in every country. They are correlated with duties and responsibilities that both citizens and health care stakeholders have to assume. The Charter applies to all individuals, recognising the fact that differences, such as age, gender, religion, socio-economic status etc., may influence individual health care needs.

In 2014, the EUPSF established task force for “Optimizing Patients Undergoing Surgery” (OPUS) with the aim to establish recommendations of best practice patterns for optimal management of patients undergoing surgery.

Sudden cardiac death is one of the most frequent preventable causes of death. More lives could be saved by increasing the lay bystander resuscitation rate. Therefore EUPSF recommends training school children in cardiopulmonary resuscitation as from the age of 12 years. Providing resuscitation training in schools has measurable effects, and by a “multiplier effect” it can increase the lay bystander resuscitation rate and the survival rate. The earlier such instruction in resuscitation is started, the more sustainable the training will be.