Friday, March 5, 2010

Safe Patients, Smart Hospitals

In Peter Pronovost's new book, Safe Patients, Smart Hospitals, he discusses a "toxic" hospital culture, in which nurses and patients don't feel that they can confront supposedly infallible doctors when they think something is going wrong.

He believes that "hospitals can't improve if they don't acknowledge their errors and try to learn from them."

Dr. Pronovost has commented on the inspiration he has drawn from working with Sorrel King and hearing the story of her 18-month old daughter, Josie, who died as a result of a hospital-acquired, central line infection.  Her story, he has said, inspired him to try to improve hospitals.  He developed a program to prevent central line infections which saved 1,500 lives and $75 million in Michigan over 18 months.  With support from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, Dr. Pronovost and his team are now working with hospitals in each state to implement this program.

Members of Dr. Pronovost's team, David Thompson, Jill Marsteller and Bryan Sexton recently completed an INQRI grant, showing promising results from the first randomized controlled trial to reduce central-line-associated blood stream infections among ICU patients.  Click here to read more about their INQRI project.

Like Dr. Pronovost, INQRI leaders are also inspired by Sorrel and Josie King.  We were very honored when Sorrel presented a webinar for us last month.  Click here to download her slides or view the presentation from your desktop.

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