What is causing physicians and hospitals to re-examine ways of working more closely together? What types of collaborative partnerships are being developed in the industry? Discuss legal issues that arise in a joint venture between a hospital and physicians that the group practice administrator must be prepared to address.
The changes in healthcare over the last several years have been dramatic. All parties, providers, insurers, and the Federal Government are looking for ways to reduce cost and increase quality. The report by the Institute for Medicine in 1999, “To Err is Human” spurred increasing scrutiny in medical care to improve quality at same and looking for ways to reduce risk to patients and increase safety. Discussion of solutions
Each year medical errors cause more than 400,000 American deaths and at least 10-20 times that number experience serious harm. Researchers say that is equivalent to “three 747 airplanes crashing each day.” Medical errors rank as the third-leading cause of death in America. Therefore, patient safety is a national concern.
I have a few suggestions that might help to improve issues of medical error and rising instances of malpractice cases. The first suggestion would be to follow the IMO’s technologic,
Hughes (2008) quoting from the , the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality handbook stated that “many view quality health care as the overarching umbrella under which patient safety resides”. Friedman, Encinosa, Jiang & Mutter (2009) found that “safety events that result in hospital readmissions lead to hefty a financial burden on the institution”. In addition they believe that if more attention is given to address and “ assess the full extra cost of safety events and the factors influencing the rate of safety events, that strategies could be developed for health plans to improve incentives for safety” Friedman, Encinosa, Jiang & Mutter (2009). The Institute of Medicine (IOM) considers patient safety “indistinguishable from the
“The Best Practices: How the New Quality Movement is Transforming Health Care” is written by Charles Kenny, who is an author, consultant, and former journalists at the Boston Globe. The author serves as a consultant to Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts, where his primary responsibilities are to improve quality and safety. As a consultant, he is familiar with health care news and the situations of the US Healthcare historically. Around 1990, several horrible cases of medical errors in Boston and other cities became a daily news. Medical errors and complications were the fifth leading cause of death, and almost 98,000 deaths were occurring which could be prevented with a quality care. A group of visionary leaders led by physicians Paul
Millions of Americans surrender to conditions that are both preventable and manageable annually. Besides chronic diseases, researchers have identified that the third leading cause of death in America is the errors conducted by professional medical practitioners. While medicine is a highly considered field, some of the practices that contribute to the errors observed include the absence of patient safety, poorly coordinated care, and inefficient healthcare quality improvement. Significant steps that can be taken to reduce deaths caused by medical errors include good communication, cooperation, use of advanced technology and implementation of quality healthcare among
The main objective of healthcare professionals is to provide the best quality of patient care and the highest level of patient safety. To achieve that objective, there are many organizations that help improve the quality of care. One of the best examples is the Joint Commission. Unfortunately, the healthcare system is not free from total risks. In healthcare activities, there are possible errors, mistakes, near miss and adverse events. All of those negative events are preventable. But, it is clear that errors caused in healthcare result in thousands of deaths in the United States.
The third leading cause of death in America may surprise you. Hospitals and healthcare organizations dedicate their branding to reflect a place of hope, comfort, and healing when ones health is compromised. Sadly, medical errors do exists in the realm of healthcare. The National Center for Biotechnology Information defines medical error as “an act of omission or commission in planning or execution that contributes to or could contribute to an unintended result.” Medical errors may include incorrect record keeping, administering incorrect medication to a patient, misdiagnosis, failing to remove all surgical instruments and performing surgery on the incorrect site. The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality identified eight factors that contribute to the cause of medical errors. These factors include “communication problems, inadequate information flow, human problems, patient-related issues, organizational transfer of knowledge, staffing patterns, technical failures and inadequate policies and procedures.”
When it comes to health care in the United States, the initial thought many people have are the many growing controversies concerning Obamacare, vaccinations, and making sure all Americans have access to affordable and quality health care. However, what many people fail to realize is a certain aspect in the medical community that, since the early 80’s with the infamous study by Berkman and Frankel, is increasing at such a tremendous rate that the Columbia Medical Review has referred to it as an “epidemic in the medical community.” The statistics regarding the number of individuals who die each year due to medical errors is rising; slowly becoming a major concern in the field. Doctors are busy individuals and at the end of the day still
In 1996, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) initiated a campaign aimed to evaluate and improve the quality of care for health care systems in America (Bielaszka-DuVernay, 2011 p.2). Consequently, IOM Committee on Quality Health Care outlined strategies to improve patient safety by preventing medical errors that are caused by individual and system factors in a report titled “To Err is Human: Building a Safer Health System” (1999). Furthermore, IOM‘s 2001 report titled, “Crossing the Quality Chasm: A New Health System for the 21st Century” emphasis the need to design an information infrastructure that supports evidence-based practice (EBP) decisions by multi-professional teams and patients (Winterbottom & Seoane, 2012 p. 389). This paper focuses on IOM‘s reports on quality by answering the following questions:
Healthcare is the single largest business around the world and plays a vital role in society today. The desire to enhance quality of care in healthcare delivery has increased tremendously.
According to the Institute of Medicine (IOM) report, To Err Is Human, the majority of medical errors result from faulty systems and processes, not individuals (Hughes, 2008). However, due to processes that are inefficient and variable, multiple health insurance, differences in provider education and experience, and other factors that contribute to the complexity of health care the IOM has put together six aims of health care that is effective, safe, patient-centered, timely, efficient, and equitable (Hughes, 2008).
It is shocking to know that every year 98000 patients die from medical errors that can be prevented(Kohn, L. T., Corrigan, J. M., & Donaldson, M. S. (Eds.), 2000). Medical errors are not a new issue in our healthcare system; these have been around for a long time. Hospitals have been trying to improve quality care and patients safety by implementing different strategies to prevent and reduce medical errors for past thirty years. Medical errors are the third leading cause of death after heart disease and cancer in America (Allen, 2013). In addition medical errors are costing our healthcare system an estimated $735 billion to $980 billion (Andel, Davidow, Hollander, & Moreno, 2012).
In today's modern world with plenty of technology, it is hard to believe that we cannot figure out how to reduce Medical errors. The issue of medical error is not new in health care organizations. It has been in spot light since 1990's, when government did research on sudden increase in number of death in the hospitals. According to Lester, H., & Tritter, J. (2001), "Medical error is an actual or potential serious lapse in the standard of care provided to a patient, or harm caused to a patient through the performance of a health service or health care professional." Medical errors
Keeping patients safe is essential in today’s health care system, but patient safety events that violate that safety are increasing each year. It was only recently, that the focus on patient safety was reinforced by a report prepared by Institute of medicine (IOM) entitled ” To err is human, building a safer health system”(Wakefield & Iliffe,2002).This report found that approx-imately 44,000 to 98,000 deaths occur each year due to medical errors and that the majority was preventable. Deaths due to medical errors exceed deaths due to many other causes such as like HIV infections, breast cancer and even traffic accidents (Wakefield & Iliffe, 2002). After this IOM reports, President Clinton established quality interagency
In today’s health care system, “quality” and “safety” are one in the same when it comes to patient care. As Florence Nightingale described our profession long ago, it takes work and vigilance to ensure we are doing the best we can to care for our patients. (Mitchell, 2008)