Invisible injuries: patient harms we hear about when we take the time to ask

Adverse event-free care or complaint-free care does not necessarily mean harm-free care for our patients

The risk of patient harms in health care is well known to most who work in health. For many years, Australian governments, agencies and health professionals have been working to reduce health care-associated adverse events and respond openly and sensitively when such events occur.1,2 However, the absence of incidents and outward signs of harm does not mean that people are not hurt by their interactions with the health care system.