Browse by Tags

• Health Policy
• Hospital Care
• Hospitalists/Hospital Medicine
• Information Technology
• Media/Press Coverage
• Medical Education/Academia
• Pay-for-performance
• Quality Improvement
• Transparency and Reporting

• How Infection Prevention Came to Dominate the Patient Safety Movement

  The Joint Commission just released its 2009 National Patient Safety Goals, and – no surprise – they focus on infection prevention. While this seems natural today, it wasn’t always so. In fact, the conflation of infection control and patient safety is Read More... Posted Sun, Jun 22 2008 1:10 AM by Bob Wachter | 2 Comments Filed under: Hospital Care, Transparency and Reporting, Quality Measurement, Patient Safety/Medical Errors, Nurses/Nursing, Health Policy

• Is Medicare’s “No Pay for Errors” Plan a Good Idea?

  In this month’s issue of the Joint Commission Journal of Quality and Patient Safety, I (with UCSF’s Adams Dudley and the American Hospital Association's Nancy Foster) tackle this provocative question. The answer may surprise you: yes (probably). The devil Read More... Posted Mon, Feb 11 2008 7:34 AM by Bob Wachter | 2 Comments Filed under: Quality Improvement, Hospital Care, Pay-for-performance, Quality Measurement, Medical Education/Academia, Hospitalists/Hospital Medicine, Patient Safety/Medical Errors, Nurses/Nursing, Media/Press Coverage

• Atul Gawande's "The Checklist"

  Let's make this short and sweet. In this week's New Yorker, Atul Gawande describes Peter Pronovost's crusade to improve the safety of intensive care through the use of checklists. If it sounds dull, it's not. In fact, it is thrilling and inspiring. Gawande Read More... Posted Sun, Dec 09 2007 8:11 AM by Bob Wachter | 5 Comments Filed under: Quality Improvement, Hospital Care, Quality Measurement, Information Technology, Patient Safety/Medical Errors, Nurses/Nursing

• Rapid Response Teams: Ready for Prime Time?

  Last year, I (with Peter Pronovost) wrote the toughest paper of my life – one that critiqued the Institute for Healthcare Improvement’s 100,000 Lives Campaign. This is the healthcare equivalent of criticizing both Mother Teresa and your local food bank Read More... Posted Tue, Nov 27 2007 9:31 AM by Bob Wachter | 4 Comments Filed under: Quality Improvement, Hospital Care, Quality Measurement, Hospitalists/Hospital Medicine, Patient Safety/Medical Errors, Nurses/Nursing, Health Policy