dispatch from HIMSS Conference 2009

Dennis Quaid delivered a keynote address on the subject of patient safety.   He has become an evangelist for Patient Safety since the well-publicized accident in which his 10-day-old twins were given 1000 times the prescribed dose of the blood thinner Heparin.  In spite of that experience, he was quick to express his deep respect for medical professionals and praise for Cedars Sinai Hospital for its responsiveness in increasing safety measures.  

He compared patient safety in hospitals to that of commercial airlines, which are so safe now that there is more risk of injury while out walking than on a commercial plane.   According to Quaid, we currently experience the hospital accident equivalent of one or more commercial airline crashes per day.  He feels that the reason is due to system failure – our technology is advanced, but, unlike in aviation, healthcare lacks systems to compensate for inevitable human error.   When there is an airline crash, the scale is such that everyone hears about it, and industry and government immediately create technology to prevent the accident from recurring.  Medical errors, on the other hand, happen one at a time, and do not create enough publicity to mobilize such change.

He hoped that advances such as envisioned by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) would bring about the needed change and spare families in the future from medical tragedies such as the one his family experienced.

From Healthcare IT News:  Healthcare IT ‘Rocket Ride’
http://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/healthcare-it-%E2%80%98rocket-ride%E2%80%99

Interoperability Showcase a Must-See Event
http://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/himss09-photo-journal-interoperability-showcase