ABSTRACT
The passage of time causes doctors to lose sight of how much they have learned and progressed since the point of qualification and can affect their ability to empathise with and supervise the most junior staff. This disconnection represents a blind spot on the part of supervisors, which may be present in addition to any blind spot bias in the trainee. Systems changes are a more reliable way to improve patient safety than educating individual staff or increasing awareness of possible cognitive errors. Given the primacy of the system in patient safety, the chapter acknowledges the socio-political climate that contributes to macro-level systems issues in healthcare. However, issues such as underfunding and understaffing are not immediately fixable as far as the new doctor is concerned, which argues for a pragmatic approach of rapidly accepting reality and employing psychological tools and strategies to keep both patients and doctors safe in the challenging circumstances at hand.
