Design Pattern · September 2026
Failure mechanism map
Locate where a regulated intervention fails, what can be measured, and which party can change the binding condition.
Under the pillar Therapeutic Enablement
Classify
Separate biological, technical, behavioral, operational, institutional, financial, informational, regulatory, and distributional failures.
Trace
For each mechanism, record the observed failure, precursor, measure, plausible cause, modifiable condition, responsible party, economic consequence, contrary evidence, and smallest test.
Decision
Work on the mechanism that limits the outcome and can be changed. Stop when the proposed mechanism is weak, immaterial, or beyond practical control.
Put this to work
Failure mechanism map application record
Apply Failure mechanism map to a real piece of work and record what happened.
- For
- Clinical, operational, product, reimbursement, and implementation leaders.
- What you keep
- A failure mechanism map application record you can review, revise, and send.
- What counts as sound
- Names a real setting
- Shows the work before and after
- Records exceptions
- Uses an observable result
- Ends with keep, revise, or stop
Clinical, regulatory, privacy, and release decisions remain with qualified people.
Nothing entered here is stored or sent. Review the prompt before sharing confidential, personal, patient, or privileged information.
Review the prompt
You can leave any field blank. The prompt will mark it as not provided.
If the record survives your review, send the question, evidence, unknowns, and requested next step.