Pushing the profession: how the news media turned patient safety into a priority

Millenson, Michael L.

doi:10.1136/qhc.11.1.57

Cited by 62 publications

(52 citation statements)

References 12 publications

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“…There is ongoing debate about the impact of adverse publicity on patient safety advances, with some commentators arguing that it provides important impetus and others that it may cause inertia. 22 Our survey results suggest that such coverage has little effect in the area of disclosure. Only two respondents indicated that their hospital's willingness to disclose had decreased as a result of prominent reporting of cases of harm.…”

Section: N F O R M a T I O Nmentioning

confidence: 88%

Hospital Disclosure Practices: Results Of A National Survey

Lamb¹,

Studdert²,

Bohmer³

et al. 2003

Health Affairs

128

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New patient safety standards from JCAHO that require hospitals to disclose to patients all unexpected outcomes of care took effect 1 July 2001. In an early 2002 survey of risk managers at a nationally representative sample of hospitals, the vast majority reported that their hospital's practice was to disclose harm at least some of the time, although only one-third of hospitals actually had board-approved policies in place. More than half of respondents reported that they would always disclose a death or serious injury, but when presented with actual clinical scenarios, respondents were much less likely to disclose preventable harms than to disclose nonpreventable harms of comparable severity. Reluctance to disclose preventable harms was twice as likely to occur at hospitals having major concerns about the malpractice implications of disclosure.T e ll i n g pat i e n ts a b o u t u nan t i c i pat e d o u tc o m e s of care is an established ethical expectation for physicians and nurses. 1 However, decisions about the appropriateness, timing, and content of disclosure have traditionally remained a private matter, left to the preferences of individual clinicians and health care institutions. Advances in informed-consent law and patients' rights over the past thirty years appear to have had little demonstrable impact on providers' willingness to disclose information about errors and adverse outcomes. 2 Today providers face new constraints in the area of disclosure. The Institute of Medicine's (IOM's) 1999 report, To Err Is Human, prompted calls for greater transparency in health care. 3 In July 2001 the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JCAHO) responded by introducing new patient safety standards, including a requirement that all unanticipated outcomes of care be disclosed. 4 Although the requirement itself does not specify the need to disclose poor

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Section: N F O R M a T I O Nmentioning

confidence: 88%

Hospital Disclosure Practices: Results Of A National Survey

Lamb¹,

Studdert²,

Bohmer³

et al. 2003

Health Affairs

128

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…The role of journalism in patient safety is interesting (Hinschcliff et al 2012;Millenson 2002), and our study is reminiscent of findings from the early days of the patient safety movement. Millenson (2002) argued that until journalists took an interest in patient safety, it had not received much attention.…”

Section: Media As Whistleblower In Risk Communicationmentioning

confidence: 52%

“…By exploring the Daniel case, we have seen how a tonsillectomy case characterized by cover-up, failure of the initial regulatory and hospital follow-up, came to a head when media shone a spotlight on the case (Hinchcliff et al 2012;Mannion and Davies 2015;Millenson 2002;Waring 2015). By bringing new information to the table including critique of regulatory follow-up, the regulatory body appeared left with no other option than to re-open the case.…”

Section: Media As Whistleblower In Risk Communicationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Millenson (2002) argued that until journalists took an interest in patient safety, it had not received much attention. As our study showed, this has similarities with the Daniel case where the regulator and the police closed the case, despite having collected information on possible cover-ups and professional battles after the event.…”

Section: Media As Whistleblower In Risk Communicationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…News media gave the Daniel case renewed urgency. Moreover, the 'people-like-you' perspective in Millenson's (2002) study, is part of the Daniel case, where people like the readers or their children could die from a routine tonsil surgery. This framing places a human face on the formal parties involved (hospital, healthcare professionals and regulators).…”

Section: Media As Whistleblower In Risk Communicationmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Transparency in Health Care: Disclosing Adverse Events to the Public

Wiig

Bourrier

Aase

et al. 2018

SpringerBriefs in Applied Sciences and Technology

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The topic of transparency has received increasing academic interest in recent years. Transparency can be interpreted as conducting affairs in the open, being subject to public scrutiny, or admitting to problems when they arise. This chapter analyses transparency in disclosing adverse events to the public in Norway. We use the widely publicized Daniel case to show the communication between the regulator and the public, discussing key elements of transparency in the healthcare setting, including the role of media. The Daniel case describes an accidental tonsillectomy characterized by cover-up, failure of the initial regulatory and hospital follow-up, coming to a head when media shone a spotlight on the case. The media coverage caused social amplification of the risk communication resulting in regulatory follow-up having to apply new forms of transparency strategies to rebuild trust in the public. By using the Daniel case as emblematic of Norwegian risk communication strategies in health care, improvements should be made along the lines of direct and adequate information exchange according to patient rights, and efforts to foster open and transparent regulatory and organizational cultures to ensure public trust.

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Agents of Change

Gallagher

O’Sullivan

2011

Fundamentals of Surgical Simulation

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Pushing the profession: how the news media turned patient safety into a priority

Cited by 62 publications

References 12 publications

Hospital Disclosure Practices: Results Of A National Survey

Hospital Disclosure Practices: Results Of A National Survey

Transparency in Health Care: Disclosing Adverse Events to the Public

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