Patient Safety at Heart of New National Risk & Safety Collaborative

OAKBROOK TERRACE, IL–(Marketwire – October 13, 2010) – The Sullivan Group, a leading provider of clinician solutions to reduce medical errors and malpractice claims, launched its National Risk & Safety Collaborative today at the ASHRM Annual Conference. The Collaborative was created to extend The Sullivan Group’s proven framework for saving lives and reducing risk with evidence-based e-Learning, software, and services. Nationally known physicians who teach patient safety in high-risk areas of medicine were chosen as Collaborative Champions for their specialties.

The Sullivan Group is exhibiting this week at the American Society for Healthcare Risk Management’s 30^th Annual ASHRM Annual Conference and Exhibition, held October 13 – 16, 2010 in Tampa; they are located in booth #200. Dr. Dan Sullivan, president and CEO of The Sullivan Group, will be joined at ASHRM by Dr. Henry Lerner, Obstetrics Champion for the Collaborative, to discuss this new initiative with conference attendees.

Dr. Sullivan states, “Collection and analysis of 12 years of medical error data proved that there needs to be a deep, systemic change in medical systems and processes in order to keep patients safe and reduce medical errors at the point of care. We all know that missing a single detail can be lethal, so risk management must be real-time and occur at the bedside. With our National Risk & Safety Collaborative we are leveraging our success and proven methodology in emergency medicine to other high-risk practice areas.”

The National Risk & Safety Collaborative represents the culmination of Dr. Sullivan’s vision for a broad-based system solution to the national medical error and patient safety problem. Preventable medical mistakes and infections are responsible for about 200,000 deaths in the U.S. each year, according to an investigation by the Hearst media corporation, which published its findings in “Dead by Mistake” in 2009.(i) The Sullivan Group’s successful Emergency Medicine solutions have been shown to reduce medical errors by up to 50%, which in turn decreases malpractice claims and associated financial losses. 

These proven solutions have been implemented at over 600 U.S. hospitals, physician groups, and risk retention groups (RRGs) nationally. Three fundamental components to The Sullivan Group’s “Risk, Safety, Quality Cycle” are incorporated in all of the solutions developed by the Collaborative. These include:

• Web-based risk and safety education covering the spectrum of high-risk care
• Bedside clinical decision support tools
• Clinical performance evaluation relative to evidence-based best practices

Collaborative Champions
 Renowned doctors have joined the National Risk & Safety Collaborative with the goal of expanding The Sullivan Group’s solutions for reducing medical errors and malpractice claims into the areas of obstetrics, surgery, hospitalist medicine, pediatrics, family practice, stroke, internal medicine, medical-legal, emergency ultrasound, toxicology, and triage. Each Champion is working with The Sullivan Group to create a scalable solution to the patient safety and risk issues for his or her specialty and build it into the fabric of delivery of medical care. This is not a single “one size fits all” solution. Each Champion will work with The Sullivan Group to develop a multi-faceted, patient-centric approach that is specific to his or her specialty and is focused on the point of care.

Dr. Lerner is developing Obstetric solutions building on The Sullivan Group framework. He explains, “Having practiced obstetrics for over 30 years, delivered over 9,000 babies, and reviewed over 300 obstetrical medical malpractice cases, I have developed a sense of which clinical practices most often lead to good outcomes and low liability and which practices do not. My goal is to share this experience in an organized, programmatic way with obstetricians and obstetrical units across the country.”

The Champions involved in the Collaborative include:

• Dan Sullivan, MD, JD, FACEP – Emergency Medicine and Medical-Legal
• Henry Lerner, MD – Obstetrics
• Geoffrey A. Machin, MD, PhD – Fetal and Placental Pathology
• Steven Selbst, MD – Pediatric Emergency Medicine
• Fred Callahan, MD – Stroke
• Scott Allen Kale, MS, JD, MD – Internal Medicine
• Paul Sierzenski, MD, RDMS, FAAEM, FACEP – Emergency Ultrasound
• Leon Gussow, MD, FACMT, RDMS – Toxicology
• Shelley Cohen, RN, MSN, CEN – Triage
• Steven Pantilat, MD – Hospitalist Medicine

The Sullivan Group has created a guide on the National Risk & Safety Collaborative, including full biographies of the Champions. For more information on The Sullivan Group’s approach for reducing medical errors and malpractice claims, view this three minute video: www.thesullivangroup.com/images/flash.html

Note to Editors: If you are interested in setting up an in-person meeting with Dr. Dan Sullivan or with Dr. Henry Lerner during ASHRM or a telephone interview after the show, please contact Maria Doyle at [email protected] or 781-964-3536.

About The Sullivan Group
 The Sullivan Group provides software and services solutions to help reduce medical errors and malpractice claims across the spectrum of high-risk clinical care. The Sullivan Group’s clients — hospitals, physician groups, and RRGs — have reduced malpractice claims and financial losses due to medical errors by up to 50%. The Sullivan Group achieves these results by leveraging an evidence-based approach to integrate extensive clinical knowledge with technology focused on the point of care. For more information, visit www.thesullivangroup.com.

(i) http://www.hearst.com/press-room/pr-20090809b.php

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