Hospital Safety

Consumer Reports decided, with its August 2012 issue, to delve into hospital safety. "How Safe Is Your Hospital" is a great article for all the wrong reasons: It is an irresistible headline and it is filled with data.  I would argue, however, the data are seriously flawed. Not that it matters. What matters is public perception which this type of article flagrantly mines and distorts.

About two weeks ago there was another editorial about hospitals being death traps on one of the medical blogs I get each week. It too, was written by a non healthcare worker and cited all the same statistics. The Consumers Reports article is even better, though, because it names names. Notice how much better little Petosky, Michigan hospital rates than the inner city hospitals of Detroit? Notice how co-morbidities and illness indices are not included in the published results? We don't see demographic data like per capita income, percent uninsured, education or employment statistics.

The fact is, hospitals and the healthcare industry should be working hard to embrace proven safety features while simultaneously getting the word out that we don't kill people. Sick people go to hospitals. The sickest people often die. And often times hospitals and physicians fall victim to patients and family demanding interventions for  people who already have one foot in the grave: They are ultra high-risk and have poor likelihood of good outcomes. Refuse to treat, however, and your patient satisfaction goes in the toilet. The Feds score that metric as well. People need to remember that all humans die and that, sometimes, it's the right thing to do.

We spend too much money and effort chasing unobtainable goals in order to meet federal criteria which, in many cases, have not been fully vetted. Case in point: listing a post-operative blood clot as something that should never happen. You will not find an academic source to substantiate that claim. Treat to prevent? Yes. Eliminate? Not yet based on any available data or protocol. We try vigorously to prevent clots but they still happen.

I love this stuff and believe the 100,00 Lives Campaign launched back in 2005 has done good in moving the industry in the right direction. I only wish nurses, doctors, and hospitals had an avenue to credibly respond to articles that distort the picture and leave hospitals looking like death traps. The hospital industry is not the lethal equivalent of a 747 crashing every day of the year. The statistics are useful but not gospel. They are, unfortunately, great for selling magazines to the wholly uninformed.