India, Oct. 6 -- There are some lessons in health care that stay with you because you have not only studied them or discussed them professionally but have experienced them yourself. I know this from personal experience. Having been a patient who developed an infection following medical care, I have a very different appreciation of what patient safety means. As health care professionals, we tend to think in terms of diagnoses, procedures, protocols and outcomes. For a patient, however, safety is more basic. It is the expectation that the treatment intended to make them better will not expose them to avoidable harm.

This is why World Patient Safety Day is more than an annual observance. The 2026 theme, "Safe care for noncommunicable diseas...