Push to improve patient safety slow-going

A 1999 report awakened the public to medical errors and sparked efforts to reduce mistakes, but some say much more needs to be done.

By Damon Adams, AMNews staff. May 7, 2001.

After shocking the public with news that medical errors kill up to 98,000 Americans each year in hospitals, a 1999 Institute of Medicine report made numerous recommendations to remedy the problem.

Among them: Create a national center to develop safety goals and fund research on errors and prevention; establish a nationwide mandatory reporting system to track errors and set up a level of voluntary reporting; develop standards to focus attention on patient safety; and launch safety programs and implement medication safety practices through health plans.

Progress has been made on some of these and other IOM suggestions, an encouraging beginning, say many health leaders. But some quality experts say it isn't enough, and they temper their optimism by saying there is still much to be done.

"Have they all been implemented? Hell, no. Some of those things are years in the establishing," said Richard Roberts, MD, president of the American Academy of Family Physicians. "It's kind of like a tugboat nudging an ocean liner; it's slow moving. You do a little nudge here knowing it will change the course miles downstream."

Key reasons why more hasn't been accomplished: The change from the Clinton to Bush administration slowed momentum; public interest has dipped since the initial outrage generated after the report's release in November 1999; and a lack of coordinated efforts has hindered progress. Meanwhile, a Harris Interactive survey released in March found that only 7% of responding physicians had adopted automated systems for prescribing drugs as recommended by the IOM, which advises Congress and the federal government on health policy matters. [...]