Science of Reliability for Patient Care - 0 views
-
Roger Steven on 30 Mar 16Overview: Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI) defines reliability as "failure-free performance over time2". This is simple enough to be understood by anyone. The aim is to have no failures over an extended time period in spite of variability in the patient environment. spite of variability in the patient environment. This is in line with the technical definition of reliability as the probability of successful performance of intended functions for a specified length of time under a specified user (patient) environment. In a system where the severity of consequences is high, such as in hospitals, the goal is to achieve reliability as close to 100% as possible. This is called failure-free performance. Some hospitals have achieved this goal for specific medical procedures for several quarters. Can they extend this performance over years instead of quarters? That is the challenge we need to face and find elegant solutions zero mistakes or find a way to protect patients if a mistake cannot be prevented. Why should you Attend: The failures of the U.S. healthcare system are enormous considering the severity of failures. As much as 400,000 patients die each year from hospital mistakes. Another 2.1 are harmed from nosocomial infections (infections acquired during hospital stay). The cost is in billions. Discussions with doctors show that there is reluctance to apply reliability principles to healthcare systems because the variability in healthcare is enormous compared to the aviation and industrial fields. Each customer (patient) is different and each illness is unique in its own way. Then there are interconnecting systems such as cardiology, gynecology, gastroenterology, emergency medicine, oncology, and patient data from various doctors, pagers, computers, vendor software, and intensive care, each operating independently most of the time. But good approaches to improving the system reliability have been tried and tested in many industries. There is a