First experiences with patient safety initiatives in Greek rural primary care. Action research by the LINNEAUS collaboration on patient safety in primary care.

Background: Accreditation of primary care organizations within Greece is still in its infancy. Our task in Greece was to attempt to introduce a patient safety initiative in a local area, focusing on developing minimum standards for accreditation, assess whether a pragmatic approach would engage physicians, and provide evidence of improvement.

Objective: To use monitoring of clinical performance as the basis for the launch of an accreditation system for primary care in Greece and to report on the process and lessons learnt.