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The Community Newspaper
Thursday, November 18, 2004
GETTING IN THE SPIRIT of the holidays at Atlantic Nursury in Freeport. See much more holiday news inside!
Medical care is a partnership
by Laura Schofer
As many as 98,000 people die in hospitals across the United States each year as the result of medical errors, according to a report issued by the Institutes of Medicine. This means that more people die from medical errors than from motor vehicle accidents, breast cancer or AIDS.
Human error: how do we avoid it? In a seminar sponsored by Persons United Limiting Substandards and Errors in Healthcare (PULSE), a panel of healthcare professionals discussed with the community how to make our health care system better. The seminar was held at the South Nassau Unitarian Universalist Congregation in Freeport on Saturday, November 13.
" "As patients we don't always know why and what went wrong," said Ilene Corina, founder and Executive Director of PULSE. "But we need to talk about these problems in order to avoid the pitfalls."
What constitutes a medical error? According to the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, "Medical errors happen when something that was planned as a part of medical care doesn't work out, or when the wrong plan was used in
the first place." These errors can happen anywhere medical care is provided including hospitals, doctors' offices and out patient clinics, for example. A Failure to Communicate
"A recent study said that about 21 percent of the public is illiterate about healthcare and can't understand the information provided on the front page of a newspaper," said Mrs. Corina. "I don't like that term. It's about the lack of communication."
Mrs. Corina played a videotape to illustrate her point. A doctor, using medical terminology, tries to explain to a patient what's wrong with him. Then the doctor goes to the post office, the auto shop and an insurance broker who all speak their own technical language. The doctor is befuddled, just like his patient.
"It's all about the power of words," said the Rev. Nancy Palmer Jones of the South Nassau Unitarian Church.
The panelists agreed. Charles Cal, assistant director for corporate quality management at North Shore-Long Island Jewish Health System, said, "Our research has shown that we have not been successful in providing information to the public We need to engage with the public and find out more about their needs and
their concerns. We must try and make intervention lead to an outcome."
"Sometimes it feels like quicksand," said moderator Beth Duthie, director of nursing at New York University Hospital in Manhattan. "Why aren't we further along? The airline industry has a fatality rate of one in a irullion and we have about one in every 300." Ms. Duthie explained that she thinks hospitals, in particular, could model some of their systems like those found in engineering and banking.
Anthony County, the assistant director of Pharmacy at New York University Medical Center, said that "we need more reporting in order to fix systems. There is a lot of fear and that means we hide things."
Dr. Joanne Holland, associate chief of Medical Services at the Northport VA Medical Center, added that "hysteria can be a barrier. But a lot has happened since
the late 1970s when I received my training. We've learned more. The culture used to be to hide things. But now we know the challenge is to put the fixes in place." Dr. Holland said that medical (continued on page 18)
IN THIS ISSUE:
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Object Description
| Rating | |
| Title | The-Leader_2004-11-18 |
| Subject | Newspaper |
| Description | This is a Newspaper distributed locally within the Village of Freeport and Baldwin. |
| Creator | Linda Toscano |
| Publisher | L & M Publications, Inc. |
| Contributors | Scanned by Imaging & Microfilm Access, Inc. (Bohemia, NY 11716) |
| Date | 2004 |
| Type | Periodical |
| Format | PDF; TIFF |
| Source | Freeport Memorial Library |
| Language | English |
| Coverage | United States |
| Rights | This digital image may be freely used for educational uses, as long as it is not altered in any way. No commercial reproduction or distribution of this image is permitted without written permission of the Freeport Memorial Library, 144 W. Merrick Road, Freeport, NY 11520 or email: frreference@freeportlibrary.info |
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