Table 4 Summary of perceived benefits and barriers

Benefits

Convenience in data entry and sharing

e-reporting has made the data entry and information sharing quick and simple.

e-reporting was considered more convenient than the alternative ways of reporting patient safety events, such as paper-based systems, writing emails, and oral reporting.

Improvement in patient safety

e-reporting was helpful in detecting problems, analyzing events and providing solutions.

e-reporting may help bring actual improvement in patient safety which was not believed due to poorly designed systems.

Barriers

Lack of instructions and trainings

The lack of training in patient safety reporting has led to reporters’ unawareness of e-reporting.

The lack of education on event analysis has made it hard for reporters to report the cases.

The lack of instruction features in e-reporting has made the use of e-reporting difficult.

Lack of reporter-friendly classification

The classifications of patient safety events were hard to understand and utilize in the real world.

Lack of time

The lack of time for reporting has affected reporters’ usage of e-reporting.

Lack of feedback

There was a lack of feedback in patient safety reporting.

The feedback expected by the reporters varied, including feedback on the process of reporting, the analysis of the cases, and the intervention for future events.