Where is Patient Safety in the Health Care Bill?

That’s the spot on question asked by those Hearst papers reporters (the same folks responsible for the blockbuster expose’ on the epidemic of medical errors in this country, Dead by Mistake).  The answer: nowhere!

Health care legislation now before Congress takes only modest steps to address a problem that is far more deadly than inadequate medical insurance: medical error.
Studies show that preventable medical errors -- ranging from poor sanitation to mistakes during surgery-- kill four times as many people as the lack of medical insurance.
In August, a national Hearst investigation, ''Dead by Mistake,'' concluded that up to 200,000 people per year die from medical errors and infections in the United States.
…
Now a Hearst analysis shows that the three health care reform bills under consideration by Congress also do not include key solutions long ago envisioned in "To Err Is Human" and lobbied against by the health care industry ever since.
Experts agree that the proposed legislation does not address key aspects of the problem..

"We are not seeing a lot about safety, which is interesting because the nation is acknowledging the 10-year anniversary of 'To Err is Human' and there is a lot of frustration that we have not made more progress," said Jim Conway, senior vice president at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement, a Boston-based nonprofit that has been pushing hospitals toward safer care.

Congress does not have a sense of urgency about medical errors, he said, and while access and insurance issues are important, Conway said he believes that patient safety should be embedded in the legislation as an "overarching" goal.

And don’t forget to also check out the op-ed in last Friday’s Houston Chronicle by our buddy N. Alex Winslow of Texas Watch that underscores how dysfunctional the Texan civil justice system is, particularly with respect to medical malpractice, leaving families to ultimately pay the price.