Survey Finds Few Takers
By Soule, Alexander
More than seven years after the launch of Leapfrog Group for Patient Safety, only Danbury Hospital and St. Vincent’s Medical Center in Bridgeport participate in the groups ongoing survey of quality-care measures intended to cut down on medical errors.
The Washington, D.C.-based Business Roundtable launched the Leapfrog Group in 2000, following a 1999 report by the Institute of Medicine indicating up to 98,000 purple died annually in U.S. hospitals from preventable errors.
Maintaining such errors are a major escalator in the cost of insurance for companies and employees, the Leapfrog Group focuses on information technology advances and instituting checklists for use by physicians in diagnosing and treating patients.
Fairfield County’s four other hospitals do not participate in the program, nor do the vast majority of medical centers in Connecticut, including Yale-New Haven Hospital. No Connecticut hospital was listed among Leapfrog Group’s 2007 list of top hospitals in the nation for patient safety and quality practices, though Montefiore Medical Center in New York City and Vassar Brothers Medical Center in Poughkeepsie were included.
In a study published in the June issue of the Joint Commission Journal on Quality and Patient Safety, researchers declared hospitals that perform well on the Leapfrog survey have lower mortality and better quality of care than the large majority that do not complete the a survey.
According to a separate study released this year however, underwritten by a grant from the federal Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, doctors are willing to report medical mistakes and learn from them, but most think current systems to do so are inadequate Of nearly 1,100 doctors polled, more than half indicated they had been involved with a “serious” error; nearly nine in 10 indicated they would be more likely to report errors if assured the information would be kept confidential.
Leapfrog Group has focused on reporting error rates for various treatments at the hospital level; in Connecticut, it appears the organization’s model of corporate pressure is nor nudging hospitals into participation, despite the association listing as members or partners some of the most prominent companies in the region, including Aetna Inc. and United Technologies Corp. in Hartford; Armonk N.Y-based IBM Corp.; Ridgefield-based Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals Inc.; and Stamford-based Thomson Reuters Corp.
Leapfrog Group’s enrollment efforts in western Connecticut are managed by the Manhattan-based New York Business Group on Health (NYBGH), which readily admits participation in the region has been low.
Laurel Pickering, executive director of NYBGH, said it is possible hospitals are not responding due to her organizations New York identity, despite the fact that it covers the tri-state region.
“We have 150 hospitals in the region that we cover and we have not been able to go (to Connecticut) and meet with the hospitals to stress the importance of this, which is what we should be doing,” Pickering said. “We also hear from the hospitals that they think they look better if they don’t submit the survey than if they do submit the survey and don’t meet the standards. Hospitals say that the survey is also a burden. Bottom line, no one is pushing them to do it and that’s what makes the difference.”
Copyright Westfair Communications Jul 14, 2008
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