The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) recently compiled data that suggests greater attention should be paid to the medical error rate. The data revealed approximately 100,000 Americans die on a yearly basis due to medical errors. The National Healthcare Quality Report (NHQR) stated "urgent attention" was needed when these statistics were published in the report back in April.

Though starting in 2015 new healthcare legislation plans to punish hospitals with high rates of preventable infections and medical errors, there isn't any reason why lawmakers and healthcare companies can't step up their game and provide better care before that time.

The NHQR tracks data on the quality of healthcare in the U.S. and analyzes this data annually. Measurement benchmarks include effectiveness, patient safety, patient centeredness of healthcare providers and timeliness of care provided. The data is analyzed first at the national level, then broken up and re-analyzed by state to determine how Kentucky shapes up in comparison with the rest of the country. The main purpose of the data is to give an overview on the general state of healthcare quality in the country, as well as to be used as a reference for lawmakers and healthcare providers in determining which reforms are needed most as they attempt to improve the system.

Dr. Carolyn M. Clancy, director of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) who constructs the NHRQ for the HHS, reported that substantial improvements in a handful of areas should not overshadow the real problems with care provided by the nation's healthcare system. Large gaps persist in certain areas of quality and access, mainly for minority and less-affluent populations. Preventative measures are far less likely to be taken with patients in these groups, thus increasing the opportunity for medical errors as situations become strained.

The NHQR has historically revealed that the elderly, infirm, and children experience disparities in the quality of healthcare received when compared to the general population. The report has revealed over the years that hospitals are able to decrease medication error rates more quickly than ambulatory care centers and nursing homes. Also, those receiving end of life care and chronic care are more likely to be the victims of medication errors than the general population, as the NHQR indicates it has historically been very difficult for those stages of care to realize high rates of quality improvement.

The AHRQ is quick to mention that by adopting certain standardized procedures, hospitals could dramatically (in some cases) reduce rates of infection acquired by people at hospitals, not enough progress has been made to effectively implement these standards. Of the five types of infections patients have a statistically significant chance of acquiring at a hospital, only one type (postoperative pneumonia) showed a decreased acquisition rate in the past year. Another rate of the five went unchanged, and the final three actually tracked an increase as much as 8 percent over the year prior.

The Agency announced in 2009 that it would begin to fund projects throughout the entire U.S. at the state level that encouraged the adoption of standardized practices proven to lead to the reduction of medical errors. New healthcare legislation will hold the feet of specific types of healthcare facilities to the flame to have their rates of certain medical errors reduced by 2015.

Source: PR-USA.net "HHS Concludes that Urgent Attention Must be Pail to Medical Error Rate"