Using research to make health care safer

There is a fine balance that needs to be maintained between research and improvement in safety and quality in health care - when do we need more research and when can we just get on with it? The moral imperative to improve care may have been a distractor, preventing adequate attention to research. Three research areas are proposed as current priorities for patient safety: getting evidence into practice, measurement of safety, and the evaluation of complex interventions. A focus on these areas should ensure that research becomes more central to the process of making health care safer.