According to estimates from the Institute of Medicine, every year preventable medical errors are responsible for as many as 98,000 deaths in the United States. In addition, billions of dollars are squandered due to increased health care costs.
A program recently launched by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is aimed at taking a bite out of preventable hospital complications and injuries.
Federal Funds Hoped to Help Lower Error Rate
Known as Partnership for Patients: Better Care, Lower Costs, the new initiative will pair HHS with a range of public and private entities, including major hospitals, health care employers and various government agencies.
Partnership for Patients will inject $1 billion of federal money provided by the Affordable Care Act directly into the health care system, offering incentives for hospitals to improve patient care and assisting doctors, nurses and others that affect patient outcomes with efforts to prevent harm.
Two broad goals are at the heart of the program: preventing patients from getting sicker or suffering from injuries within the health care system and facilitating healthy healing and the avoidance of complications by improving the transition from hospitals to homes, skilled nursing facilities or other care settings.
Although Partnership for Patients will seek to reduce all types of harm, nine areas of specific focus have been identified as pertinent starting points, including adverse drug events (e.g., allergic reactions, overdoses or providing the wrong drug to a patient), surgical site infections, catheter-associated urinary tract infections and ventilator-associated pneumonia. Some health care institutions have already displayed great success in reducing such harms, and their prevention efforts will serve as a model for others.
Ambitious Goals Could Pay Off
According to HHS, Partnership for Patients will result in 60,000 lives saved over the course of the next three years, and $35 billion in health care cost savings.
Hopefully, Partnership for Patients will successfully stem the flood of medical mistakes that affects thousands of patients and their family members every year. If you or a loved one has suffered harm in a hospital or other care facility, be sure those responsible are held accountable by consulting a medical malpractice attorney today.
