The Institute of Medicine’s December 1999 report, “To Err Is Human,” put the entire healthcare community on high alert. It told us medical errors in hospitals account for between 48,000 and 98,000 deaths per year in the U.S.
The report prompted HCA Healthcare to commit to creating a culture of patient safety throughout its 190 hospitals. Thomas F. Frist, Jr., MD, HCA’s co-founder, and former chairman, is fond of saying “putting patients first” is the secret of success in healthcare. This simple statement quickly became the foundation of HCA’s culture and passion for patient safety and led to the development of the following goals:
- Establish patient safety as a visible commitment to our “putting patients first” philosophy
- Move from blaming people to improving processes
- Improve use of technology to prevent and detect error
- Use data to identify and measure improvements
View the ASR Alert Systems HCA South Florida case study here…
