PROFESSIONAL ISSUES

States moving ahead on patient safety front

Four states have created safety centers this year.

By Andis Robeznieks, AMNews staff. July 26, 2004.

As no action has been taken on patient safety legislation in the U.S. Senate since it reported out of committee Nov. 17, some individual states have decided to act on the Institute of Medicine's 1999 recommendations to develop error-reporting systems and create patient safety centers to collect and disseminate this information.

Twenty-two states now have some type of reporting system in place, and six have created patient safety centers, said Jill Rosenthal, a project manager with the Portland, Maine-based National Academy for State Health Policy.

And while experts concede that there eventually could be some minor duplication of state and federal activities, many believe that the dual systems will evolve into complementary rather than competing roles.

"The states are often the laboratories for health care issues," Rosenthal said. "This is another example where states aren't waiting for the federal government and are moving ahead with their own plans."

Rosenthal said there was still some physician opposition to error-reporting because there is a concern that the information collected will be used against them, but research done by her organization indicates this isn't being done. "We couldn't find any examples of malpractice attorneys using this data," she said.

An NASHP study issued last fall concluded that it was too early to tell what level of error and adverse event reporting improves patient safety, and because four of the state patient safety centers are brand new (Florida, Maryland, Maine and Oregon), Rosenthal said it's far too early to conclude how effective these centers will be.

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