SOPS Hospital Survey Data Submission Information

Participation Requirements

• Hospitals must be located in the United States or in a U.S. territory where patients stay overnight, provided the data are submitted in accordance with the guidelines for using the SOPS trademark and are formatted according to the site and data specifications.
• Each hospital must have minimum of 10 responses.

1. Hospital Site Information: Users can upload hospital site information in one of two ways, one at a time through the online site information form or all at once in an Excel spreadsheet. Each hospital, including those from a health care system, is considered a separate hospital for submission purposes and must be submitted with a unique site identification number.
   Please use the Hospital Site-Level Specifications (PDF, 178 KB, PDF HELP) as a guide when entering your site information.
   • Sample Hospital Site Information Excel File (XLSX, 13 KB)
2. Hospital Questionnaire(s) Administered: Users will need to upload a copy of the actual questionnaire(s) administered. If you used a copy of the Spanish questionnaire, please upload this questionnaire as well. We will review the submitted questionnaire(s) and users will receive an approved/not approved email within 3 business days. You will not be able to submit your survey data in step 4 until your questionnaire has been approved.
   
   Your questionnaire will not be approved if:
   • You made changes to any of the core* survey item text and/or response options. Changes can only be made to the units/work areas, staff positions, and background questions at the end of the survey. If units/work areas and/or staff positions are modified, they need to be crosswalked back to the original survey categories before submitting data.
   • You reordered the core survey items
   • You deleted one or more core survey items. Only background questions at the end can be removed.
   • You inserted new or supplemental questions within the core survey. All new or supplemental questions should be added toward the end of the survey, right before the background questions at the end (Section G of the SOPS Hospital Survey 2.0.).
   *NOTE: Core survey items are the survey items in Sections A-F in SOPS Hospital Survey 2.0. The core does not include units/work areas, staff positions, and background questions at the end of the survey. Be sure to include any definitions of terms, subheadings (re-lettering as needed), and instructions in the survey.
   Hospitals that administer the SOPS Hospital Survey 2.0 with the Health Information Technology Patient Safety, Workplace Safety, and/or Value and Efficiency Supplemental Item Sets must comply with the following guidelines:
   • To administer only a subset of the supplemental item sets, include all items within the composite measures you want to assess.
   • For composite measures you do not want to assess, delete all the items in those composite measures.
   • Do not reorder items within a composite measure.
   • Be sure to include any definitions of terms, subheadings (re-lettering as needed), and instructions in the supplemental item set.
3. Data Use Agreement (DUA): Each hospital is required to submit a signed DUA. Please sign and return a copy of your DUA via:
   • The DUA Submission Portal
   • Email DatabasesOnSafetyCulture@westat.com, or
   • Fax 1-888-852-8277
     • SOPS Hospital Data Use Agreement (PDF, 135 KB, PDF HELP)
4. Hospital Survey Data: Users will need to upload their hospital survey data, conforming to data specifications of the survey version you administered listed below. Your data will not be accepted if you combined data from multiple site locations under a single site identification number.
   
   Supported Survey Version
   
   Version 2.0

   • SOPS Hospital Survey 2.0 Data Specifications (PDF, 258 KB, PDF HELP)
     • Sample Hospital Survey 2.0 Data File (XLSX, 13 KB)
   • SOPS Hospital Survey 2.0 Data Specifications with Health IT Patient Safety, Workplace Safety and/or Value and Efficiency (PDF, 258 KB, PDF HELP)
     • Sample Hospital Survey 2.0 with Health IT Patient Safety, Workplace Safety and/or Value and Efficiency Data File (XLSX, 13 KB)

Benefits of Participation

• Each participating hospital receives a feedback report comparing their results to the database.
• Additional results by hospital characteristics (bed size, teaching status, ownership and control, region) and respondent characteristics (e.g., hospital work area/unit, staff position, interaction with patients) will also available in the SOPS Hospital Database Report.