UW Medicine launched the Bias Reporting Tool in early 2021 to provide our community with a new way to report incidents of bias. Since then, over 1,500 events have been reported.
The Third Annual BRT Community Report provides information about 460 events reported in the past year (June 2023 – May 2024). The report’s purpose is to raise awareness about what our community is experiencing. The information also helps us see patterns of biased behavior and identify areas needing more investment, training, policy, practice and process changes. In this year’s report, read about an increase in accounts of verbal bias incidents involving patients in clinical spaces. There has also been an increase in anonymous reporting, which can limit our ability to follow up to learn more and provide helpful resources. We encourage, when possible, providing contact information when reporting acts of bias.
Additional Resources
For concerns related to workplace conflict, you can reach out to a supervisor, manager, union representative, or human resources consultant for additional support.
For concerns related to the treatment or care of an individual patient, please submit a SafetyNet report (AMC login required) as there is now a way to identify bias involved in a patient care event using the SafetyNet system. BRT cannot contain protected health information (PHI).
For events needing additional investigation, consider reporting the event to the university’s Civil Rights Investigation Office. This is an investigative body that can offer an external investigation into concerns including discrimination, retaliation or gender-based harassment. This office formerly operated as two offices: the University Complaint Investigation and Resolution Office and the Title IX Investigation Office.
