Out-of-the-Box Lawyering

Hospitals can reduce if not eliminate medical malpractice and patient deaths and complications - - Some are already doing it

I have reported in a number of postings that the way to reduce the number of medical malpractice suits is to reduce the amount of medical malpractice. Here, for instance, are a couple of my postings:

“Here's one out-of-the-box way to reduce medical malpractice suits: Reduce the medical malpractice — A new study reports that an average of 195,000 people have died annually due to errors in hospitals” http://www.outoftheboxlawyering.com/archives/000053.html

“90,000 patients a year die from hospital-acquired infections - - How to reduce the number of medical malpractice cases by reducing the medical malpractice”
http://www.outoftheboxlawyering.com/archives/000072.html

Well, hospitals are beginning to reduce if not eliminate some hospital-acquired injuries and infections.

The Washington Post, in an article entitled “Hospitals Cutting Patient Complications,” reports that “about 80 hospitals in Michigan and New Jersey have virtually eliminated ventilator-associated pneumonia and blood infections from neck and groin catheters.” (Registration required.)

The article continues that some New Jersey hospitals have reduced their ventilator-pneumonia cases and catheter-related infections by a third by following steps such as weaning patients off ventilators more quickly and using a stronger skin disinfectant when inserting a catheter.

Similarly, “[i]n Michigan last year, 77 hospitals cut the number of catheter-related blood infections and ventilator-associated pneumonia cases so much that hospital officials believe they prevented 73 deaths from pneumonia and four from blood infections.”

The article also refers to the Institute for Healthcare Improvement, which has a “100,000 Lives Campaign.” That campaign is to save 100,00 lives each year by focusing on six problem areas, including medication errors. As IHI further describes its goal:

IHI and other organizations that share our mission are convinced that a remarkably few proven interventions, implemented on a wide enough scale, can avoid 100,000 deaths over the next 18 months, and every year thereafter.

Click here for IHI's Frequently Asked Questions

A postscript:

After I drafted this posting, it was disheartening to read an op-ed piece in The New York Times with the sub-headline "Bad hygiene is killing patients."

The piece was by a Betsy McCaughey, a former New York lieutenant governor and the founder of the Committee to Reduce Infection Deaths. In it, she details how poor hygiene is causing "[i]nfections that have been nearly eradicated in some other countries [to be] raging through hospitals in the United States." She notes that the problem is magnified because many of the infections are immune to being cured by common antibiotics.

Her solutions include enforcement of better hand washing techniques and the use of disposable gowns and aprons. She adds that when the veterans hospital in Pittsburgh used better procedures, it reduced by 85 percent staph bacteria that was resistant to methicillin, and the University of Virginia Medical Center eradicated the problem.

Partial links:

Source from The New York Times, June 5, 2005, p. A23. http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/06/opinion/06mccaughey.html

Institute for Healthcare Improvement: http://www.ihi.org

Institute for Healthcare Improvement Frequently Asked Questions: http://www.ihi.org/IHI/Programs/Campaign/Campaign.htm?TabId=6

Institute for Healthcare Improvement goal of saving 100,000 lives annually: http://www.ihi.org/IHI/Programs/Campaign/Campaign.htm?TabId=1

Washington Post article: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/03/AR2005060300235.html

Posted by ajlevy at June 7, 2005 10:45 AM