LANSING—Governor Granholm and Michigan Department of Community Health will hear recommendations from the State Commission on Patient Safety today, which was created in an effort to improve patient safety and reduce health care errors across Michigan.
Representative Sheltrown has been a strong supporter of this initiative and has been eagerly awaiting the outcome of the year-long research performed by the Commission. "I have always been a proponent of northern Michigan's health care community and believe that these recommendations will be a welcome addition to the community's toolbox for providing quality care," says Sheltrown. "While hospitals and clinics work to give the safest care possible, some mistakes are bound to occur. This is true of any industry. However, patients should have access to medical error information in order to make sound health care decisions for themselves."
Representative Sheltrown was made aware of the need for medical error reporting after a constituent told him of malpractice she experience by a medical professional who she later learned was facing other malpractice charges. She believes that the harm done could have been avoided if medical error information had been readily available before treatment was sought.
"What this comes down to is consumer choice based on safety and a way to eliminate malpractice before it occurs. We are called upon to be educated consumers and this should extend into health care choices. In order to make educated decisions, it is necessary that patient safety information be available," says Sheltrown.
The Commission on Patient Safety has studied the best ways to provide medical error and health care choice information to consumers since the Commission's creation in 2005. The Commission consists of representatives from 15 organizations that include health plans, major employers, professional associations, and hospital, physician, consumer, and labor organizations. Highlights of the Commission's recommendations include:
- Creating a Michigan Center for Safe Health Care, a freestanding, non-profit organization to coordinate efforts around the state to reduce patient harm. Several states have enacted legislation supporting the creation of such patient safety centers to address the problem of health care errors.
- Establishing a statewide, confidential, non-punitive, voluntary error reporting system. The Michigan Center for Safe Health Care would design, implement and manage the reporting system, which would be used to identify important areas.
- Increasing outreach to patients, their families, and consumers, in general, to make them partners in patient safety.
The Commission's report contains 13 major patient safety objectives. The report will be available by accessing the MDCH website at www.michigan.gov/mdch/.