April 14, 2009

Coalition for Quality and Patient Safety of Chicagoland Coalition to
Host June 3 Summit

CHICAGO (April 14) – Chicago-area Patient safety leaders announced today the establishment of the Coalition for Quality and Patient Safety of Chicagoland (CQPS), with the implementation of a Patient Safety Organization (PSO) dedicated to improving safety and quality of care in the Chicago area as one of its core initiatives.  The Coalition, a program of the Institute of Medicine of Chicago (IOMC), will be housed at the Metropolitan Chicago Healthcare Council (MCHC). Its PSO is one of the first to be certified to operate by the federal government, and will be dedicated solely to assisting Chicago-area healthcare providers and the communities they serve.

The CQPS mission is to mobilize the diverse healthcare stakeholders in metropolitan Chicago to provide the best possible care to every patient every time by eliminating preventable harm and implementing systemic change to ensure consistent excellence. Ramp up of CQPS, as well as the earlier work of the Chicago Patient Safety Forum which CQPS succeeds, has been supported from its inception by the Otho S. A. Sprague Memorial Institute. This work also has been supported by the Illinois Department of Public Health and other public and private sector sources that seek to advance patient safety.

“CQPS and its PSO will provide healthcare, business, government and consumer partners with an exciting venue to work together to improve patient outcomes,” said Carrie E. Nelson, MD, Vice-President of the IOMC Board of Governors. “I expect that our efforts will provide opportunities to achieve levels of safer, more effective care never before achievable in Chicago. Our PSO will start with hospital reporting, and move to engage long-term care, physician groups and others who can contribute to and benefit from the learning PSOs can foster.  Patients will be at the center of all we do.”

Enabled by the federal Patient Safety and Quality Improvement Act of 2005, PSOs are just now being certified under federal regulations finalized late last year. PSOs will provide hospitals with a systemic pathway for sharing reports and investigations of incidents that harmed or could have harmed patients. A PSO has the potential to foster huge leaps in safety by aggregating large numbers of reports, analyzing them for common causes or risk factors, and feeding back solutions to all hospitals and other healthcare organizations that participate. “The beauty of the Coalition’s PSO is that hospitals in the Chicago area will learn much more from each other than they can just by looking at their own safety, quality and performance incidents,” said Trish Anen, vice president of clinical services for MCHC. “MCHC member hospitals are committed to quality and safety, making this alignment with CQPS a perfect opportunity to make the Chicago metropolitan area among the safest healthcare communities anywhere.”

CEO Appointed

CQPS also announced the appointment of Martin J. Hatlie, JD as its first chief executive officer.

Hatlie has a long track record of building successful collaborations among healthcare stakeholders. He is a co-founder of Consumers Advancing Patient Safety (CAPS), a Chicago-based, internationally active nonprofit organization focused on creating a safer future through constructive partnership among consumers, providers and policymakers. He will remain on the CAPS board and active in that organization.

“Marty Hatlie is a leader making global impact for advancing broad-based collaboration in the patient safety field,” said Nelson. “He has an extraordinary ability to reach across boundaries in the complex world of healthcare – from consumers and patients to providers, employers, government, and insurers – to build a common vision for change.” Nelson said.

Hatlie, an attorney, was the first executive director of the National Patient Safety Foundation, established and spun off by the American Medical Association in 1997. His commitment to engaging consumers in constructive partnership led to the establishment of CAPS in 2003, which he co-founded with patients, families and healthcare workers who had experienced preventable harm in healthcare.  Hatlie has worked with CAPS and the World Health Organization (WHO) to develop workshops around the globe that generate “patient safety champions” united by a pledge of partnership to achieve safer care, including a workshop developed with Northwestern Memorial Hospital last year. He also owns a company called Partnership for Patient Safety (p4ps), which produces patient safety educational programs and training films.

“I am thrilled to be working with the dedicated leaders that developed CQPS and its PSO,” Hatlie said. “We have an incredible opportunity in Chicago to develop a world-class model for working with patients, not just for them. Patients and their families are under-utilized resource we will encourage to become involved in all of our CQPS initiatives.”

Hatlie currently serves on WHO’s Patients for Patient Safety Steering Committee, the Joint Commission’s Sentinel Event Advisory Group, the board of Parents of Infants and Children with Kernicterus, and is involved in several research and education projects.

June 3 Summit Planned

Hatlie announced that the CQPS’s first large-scale effort will be a summit open to all stakeholder groups on June 3 at the University of Illinois Medical Center in Chicago.

“The summit provides an opportunity for all anyone dedicated to advancing safer, higher quality care in Chicago to give CQPS input,” said Hatlie. “We will listen and be responsive.”

Co-sponsors to date include the Institute of Medicine of Chicago, Metropolitan Chicago Healthcare Council, University of Illinois at Chicago Institute for Patient Safety Excellence and MacNeal Hospital. The CQPS summit is open to the public. Summit registration material and more information on CQPS can be found at www.chicagopatientsafety.org

October 24, 2008

p4ps Helps Kick Off National Family Caregivers Month

CHICAGO, October 24, 2008 – National Family Caregivers Month, celebrated every November, is a nationally recognized time set aside every year to thank, support, educate and empower more than 50 million family caregivers across the country currently providing over $350 billion in "free" caregiving services. Celebrating NFC Month in your community can raise awareness about your programs.

FREE Family Caregiver National TeleClass in November

This FREE two-part series features 2 one-hour phone calls:
• Date: November 6 and 13 at 2 p.m. ET
• Title: Communicating Effectively with Healthcare Professionals
• To register visit: www.thefamilycaregiver.org or call 800-896-3650

p4ps is pleased to be an endorsing organization of NFC Month, created by the National Family Caregivers Association to bring attention to the needs of family caregivers. "This year we are encouraging people to speak up during National Family Caregivers Month." said Suzanne Mintz, NFCA president and co-founder. "One of the most important attributes of being an advocate for your loved one is the ability to speak up to health care professionals protecting not only the health and safety of your loved ones but for yourself as well."

Top 10 Ways to Celebrate National Family Caregivers Month 2008

1. Offer a few hours of respite time to a family caregiver so they spend time with friends, or simply relax.

2. Send a card of appreciation or a bouquet of flowers to brighten up a family caregiver’s day.

3. Encourage local businesses to offer a free service for family caregivers through the month of November.

4. Invite family caregivers to participate in the National Family Caregivers Association’s FREE national TeleClass to learn how to communicate more effectively with health care professionals. The 2 free one hour sessions will be November 6 and 13 at 2 p.m. ET. For more information visit www.thefamilycaregiver.org.

5. Help a family caregiver decorate their home for the holidays or offer to address envelopes for their holiday cards.

6. Offer comic relief! Purchase tickets to a local comedy club, give a family caregiver your favorite funny movie to view, or provide them with a book on tape.

7. Find 12 different family photos and have a copy center create a monthly calendar that the family caregiver can use to keep track of appointments and events.

8. Offer to prepare Thanksgiving dinner for a caregiving family in your community, so they can just relax and enjoy the holiday.

9. Take a few minutes to write a letter encouraging your mayor, county executive, or governor to issue a local proclamation establishing November as National Family Caregivers Month. Contact information for state government officials can be found at www.firstgov.gov.

10. Help family caregivers find information and resources on the internet or to locate a local support group.

September 21, 2008

p4ps partners with Salus Global to develop French language version of First Do No Harm® films

Partnership for Patient Safety announced today that its First, Do No Harm® interactive video series  is being dubbed in French, through a joint venture arrangement with Salus Global, a Canadian firm.  Salus Global services include the MORE^OB program, a comprehensive, three-year, patient safety, professional development, and performance improvement program for caregivers and administrators in hospital obstetrics units. The French iteration of the First, Do No Harm® series will be available in October 2008.

The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) has produced a new compendium, entitled Advances in Patient Safety: New Directions and Alternative Approaches. 

The four-volume compendium, which is also available as a searchable CD-ROM, highlights new knowledge and lessons learned in such critical areas as reporting systems, risk assessment, health information technology, clinical process redesign, and medical simulation. The new compendium is a follow-up to an earlier one published by AHRQ in 2005. To order single copies of the printed compendium (AHRQ Pub. No. 08-0034) or the CD-Rom (AHRQ Pub. 08-0034-CD), please call the AHRQ Publications Clearinghouse at (800) 358-9295 or send an e-mail to ahrqpubs@ahrq.gov. Single copies of the printed 4-volume set or individual volumes are free. Additional copies are $5.00 per volume ($20.00 per printed set). Customers can receive up to 10 (ten) copies of the CD-ROM free of charge. Additional copies of the CD-ROM are $1.25 each. 

p4ps president, Martin Hatlie, co-authors two articles in this rich new resource.  Visit AHRQ to view the table of contents and get more information.