People often ask me how our doctors feel about the things I post on this blog. The answer, of course, is as varied as our faculty, and -- trust me -- our faculty is not the least bit shy about letting me know how they feel. After I wrote a post on safety and quality a couple of weeks ago, one of our doctors wrote me the following note. I'd like to share it with you to get your reactions. Please understand that this is a world class clinician who is beloved by his patients and who has an exemplary record in safety and quality. So he is not saying we shouldn't be good at that, but he is saying something about how he thinks the hospital marketplace really works and what I should be emphasizing in public statements.
No one in their right mind could want anything but the safest possible hospital. But complex human organizations are inherently frail in the infallibility department. So while we have to work on this continually, we should not confuse that with "quality".
In the marketplace, people want the "best doctor". You will never hear anyone saying that they picked their doctor because the hospital he practiced at had a better safety record.
While we have to be excellent at safety, quality in the minds of the public is related to whether they think that the care they are getting from their doctor is the best. By this they mean, is the doctor practicing at the very highest level, making the right diagnosis, giving them access to the cutting edge and best therapies. Quality is not how many falls we have, because even though you and I know that the falls are dangerous and kill people, no one comes into the hospital thinking that they are going to fall.
If you make patient safety your acid test, you are not going to attract the kind of patients you need to stay in business. The difference, in the mind of the public, between quality and safety is huge. Quality means the medical care expectations. Safety is merely expected…until something goes wrong.
So, from my point of view, the emphasis at BIDMC has to be on quality, as in finding things that we are simply the best in the world at, and riding that wave.
No one in their right mind could want anything but the safest possible hospital. But complex human organizations are inherently frail in the infallibility department. So while we have to work on this continually, we should not confuse that with "quality".
In the marketplace, people want the "best doctor". You will never hear anyone saying that they picked their doctor because the hospital he practiced at had a better safety record.
While we have to be excellent at safety, quality in the minds of the public is related to whether they think that the care they are getting from their doctor is the best. By this they mean, is the doctor practicing at the very highest level, making the right diagnosis, giving them access to the cutting edge and best therapies. Quality is not how many falls we have, because even though you and I know that the falls are dangerous and kill people, no one comes into the hospital thinking that they are going to fall.
If you make patient safety your acid test, you are not going to attract the kind of patients you need to stay in business. The difference, in the mind of the public, between quality and safety is huge. Quality means the medical care expectations. Safety is merely expected…until something goes wrong.
So, from my point of view, the emphasis at BIDMC has to be on quality, as in finding things that we are simply the best in the world at, and riding that wave.
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