Patient safety: A leadership opportunity

The AMA has published tool kits designed to encourage doctors to get involved in the 100,000 Lives Campaign.

Editorial. Nov. 14, 2005.

When it comes to improving patient safety, who better to take up the charge than physicians? Their relationships with patients, hospitals and their communities make them naturals.

But how does one go about tackling such an enormous undertaking? Certainly not alone and not without guidance.

Fortunately for physicians interested in getting involved, a program already exists that they can jump into. The initiative, called the 100,000 Lives Campaign, encourages hospitals to apply six evidence-based interventions. The goal is to prevent 100,000 avoidable deaths in hospitals over the course of 18 months, ending in June 2006, and maintain this progress each year thereafter.

The interventions are to deploy rapid response teams that quickly address early signs of patient distress; to ensure the best care for people with acute myocardial infarction; and to prevent surgical site infections, ventilator-associated pneumonia, central line infections and adverse drug events.

So far, more than 2,800 hospitals are involved in the effort -- well more than the 2,000 originally hoped for -- that started in December 2004. But such initiatives cannot succeed without physician participation. That's where the American Medical Association comes in.

The AMA is a strategic partner in the initiative, launched by the Institute for Healthcare Improvement. In this role, the AMA is spreading the word to physicians through its Making Strides in Safety program.

The Association's latest action is to publish two online tool kits to encourage physicians to join the initiative. Both explain the campaign, highlight why physician participation is so important and offer practical advice doctors can take to get started.