Reducing health care hazards: lessons from the commercial aviation safety team.
The movement to improve quality of care and patient safety has grown, but examples of measurable and sustained progress are rare. The slow progress made in health care contrasts with the success of aviation safety. After a tragic 1995 plane crash, the aviation industry and government created the Commercial Aviation Safety Team to reduce fatal accidents. This public-private partnership of safety officials and technical experts is responsible for the decreased average rate of fatal aviation accidents. We propose a similar partnership in the health care community to coordinate national efforts and move patient safety and quality forward.
Pronovost
Peter J
PJ
Department of Anesthesiology and Critical Care Medicine at the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland, USA. ppronovo@jhmi.edu
Goeschel
Christine A
CA
Olsen
Kyle L
KL
Pham
Julius C
JC
Miller
Marlene R
MR
Berenholtz
Sean M
SM
Sexton
J Bryan
JB
Marsteller
Jill A
JA
Morlock
Laura L
LL
Wu
Albert W
AW
Loeb
Jerod M
JM
Clancy
Carolyn M
CM
D000060:Accidents, Aviation / Q000517:prevention & control*; D026661:Clinical Trials Data Monitoring Committees / Q000639:trends*; D003299:Cooperative Behavior; D016208:Databases, Factual / Q000639:trends; D005544:Forecasting; D018166:Health Care Reform; D006291:Health Policy / Q000639:trends*; D006801:Humans; D033183:Interdisciplinary Communication; D019300:Medical Errors / Q000517:prevention & control*; D011787:Quality of Health Care / Q000639:trends*; D012308:Risk Management / Q000639:trends; D017751:Safety Management / Q000639:trends*; D014481:United States