Who doesn't make mistakes - Creating a safer healthcare system

Author: (USA) Cohen (USA) Cregan (USA) Donaldson Wang Xiaobo
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-01-01
Features: According to expert estimates, as many as 98,000 people die each year in the USA due to medical errors in hospitals, a number higher than those who die in car accidents, breast cancer, and AIDS. However, public attention to these three causes of death far exceeds that of medical errors. In fact, the number of deaths from medical errors each year is significantly greater than the number of occupational fatalities. Although errors are easily identified in hospitals, the problem is that these errors have spread to every healthcare setting, including "same-day surgery centers," outpatient clinics, retail pharmacies, nursing homes, and home care facilities. The heavy financial burden, coupled with the tragedies caused to patients and their families, makes medical errors a widespread and urgent issue in healthcare. Faced with these alarming statistics, the Institute of Medicine has launched a program to assess the quality of healthcare in the USA and has recommended a series of stringent reforms. "To Err Is Human" is the Institute of Medicine's public publication on a series of healthcare initiatives, breaking the silence surrounding medical errors and their consequences, but not directly targeting healthcare professionals who make these mistakes. After all, errors are made by people. As an alternative, the book proposes a national agenda, using state and local research findings to design a safer healthcare system and improve patient safety. The book reveals the shocking reality of medical errors and the asymmetry between the nature of these events and public understanding of them. It explores how laws, regulations, and market forces constrain and influence healthcare quality, as well as how medical errors are handled. Using a very detailed representative case as an example, the book examines the causes of these errors. Without a doubt, if legal liability or other interests might hinder the reporting of errors, the book asks, "How can we learn from our own mistakes?" Compared to market-based priority rules and individual efforts to balance official initiatives, the Institute of Medicine has proposed broad recommendations to improve leadership, enhance data collection and analysis, and guide the refinement of patient care systems. The book repeatedly emphasizes that healthcare professionals are not bad people; what we need to do is create a safer healthcare environment. The book provides a clear prescription for improving patient safety and explains how patients themselves can influence the quality of care they receive. This book will be extremely important for federal, state, and local healthcare policymakers and regulators, licensing officials for healthcare professionals, hospital administrators, medical educators and students, healthcare providers, health journalists, patient advocacy lawyers, and patients themselves.