Paul O’Neill has a serious set of questions about health care reform.
1.Which of the reform proposals will eliminate the millions of infections acquired at hospitals every year?
2. Which of the proposals will eliminate the annual toll of 300 million medication errors?
3. Which of the proposals will eliminate pneumonia caused by ventilators?
4. Which of the proposals will eliminate falls that injure hospital patients?
5. Which of the proposals will capture even a fraction of the roughly $1 trillion of annual “waste” that is associated with the kinds of process failures that these questions imply?
So far, the answer to each question is “none.”
Quality improvement is the stepchild of health care today. I spent a year at Dartmouth in 1994-95 to learn the methodology of quality improvement and then learned that no one was interested. The impression, I believe, was that quality improvement would be more expensive and no one wanted to spend the money. O’Neill’s point is that, ultimately, poor quality is more expensive but no one seems willing, with a few honorable exceptions, to learn if that is true.
So far, the health care reform proposed by Congress and Obama ignores the subject.
No one concerned with excellence in health care can trust these people to address the problems.
Tags: Congress, health care reform, Obama
Mike… Mike… Mike… you incorrigible cynic.
What…?! You mean you don’t believe that with a wave of Obama’s mighty wand of power all 300 million plus Americans (plus illegal aliens) will receive the same exact level of care that say… Teddy Kennedy receives?
Mike… you’ve got to… er… HOPE. It’s all about the HOPE brother!
(*SNORT*) (*HEADING TO THE LIQUOR CABINET AT 8:45 AM*)
BILL
P.S. – Have you dropped by the “new” New Majority this morning? I’m locked out – can’t sign in.
I looked at it but couldn’t figure out the layout and quickly gave up. Lazy, I guess but David is drifting into moonbat territory if he doesn’t watch out.
He is unhappy with NRO and once complained to me that he had never been invited on one of the cruises. Some of this is personal with him and that is not a good basis for criticism.