The Risk of Being Hospitalized - Epilogue

A new article in the New England Journal of Medicine titled "Perspective - Improving Patient Safety Five Years After the IOM Report" (v 351, p 2041, 2004) has just been published, dealing with these very issues. The article states that a major obstacle is the absence of consensus on the focus of safety improvements, including how to collect and report information on the quality and safety of hospitals and health care providers.

According to this article, physicians believe that developing systems to avoid medical errors, and increasing the number of nurses in hospitals are the best approach to reducing errors. Other measures that have been suggested, such as limiting certain high-risk procedures to specific centers, using only physicians trained in intensive care in hospital intensive care units, increasing the use of computerized ordering systems, and computerizing medical records, get less physician support.

Not surprisingly, physicians strongly oppose public reporting of medical errors, whereas the public strongly supports reporting. What is really needed, according to the article, is a culture that encourages sharing rather than hiding of errors and near misses. Ultimately, the public needs to drive a push towards event reporting - they are the interested and most affected, and they need to make their voice heard.

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Last Modification - November 13, 2004