Institute for Healthcare Improvement’s 5 Million Lives Campaign
Metro Health participates in the Institute for Healthcare Improvement's 5 Million Lives Campaign launched in December 2006.
The objective of the 5 Million Lives Campaign is to:
- Protect patients from five million incidents of medical harm over the next two years (December 2006 - December 2008).
The Institute for Healthcare Improvement defines medical harm as:
- Unintended physical injury resulting from or contributed to by medical care (including the absence of indicated medical treatment), that requires additional hospitalization or that results in death.
- Such injury is considered harm whether or not it is considered preventable, whether or not it resulted from a medical error, and whether or not it occurred within a hospital.
Interventions included in the campaign include:
- Prevent Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) infection by reliably implementing scientifically proven infection control practices throughout the hospital
- Reduce harm from high-alert medications starting with a focus on anticoagulants, sedatives, narcotics, and insulin
- Reduce surgical complications by reliably implementing the changes in care recommended by the Surgical Care Improvement Project (SCIP)
- Prevent pressure ulcers by reliably using science-based guidelines for prevention of this serious and common complication
- Deliver reliable, evidence-based care for congestive heart failure to reduce readmissions
- Get boards on board by defining and spreading new and leveraged processes for hospital boards of directors, so they can become far more effective in accelerating the improvement of care
- Deploy Rapid Response Teams at the first sign of patient decline and before a catastrophic cardiac or respiratory event
- Deliver reliable, evidence-based care for acute myocardial infarction to prevent deaths from heart attack
- Prevent adverse drug events by reconciling patient medications at every transition point in care
- Prevent central line infections by implementing a series of interdependent, scientifically grounded steps
- Prevent surgical site infections by following a series of steps, including reliable, timely administration of correct perioperative antibiotics
- Prevent ventilator-associated pneumonia by implementing a series of interdependent, scientifically grounded steps
For more information, visit: www.ihi.org/campaign