Report Questions Patient Safety Training, Recommends Improvements

Although John Prescott, MD, chief academic officer at the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC), said that educating new doctors about patient safety has been a top priority for American medical schools and teaching hospitals for the last decade, the report asks for more traction from in this area. There are few schools that take a longitudinal, four-year approach to patient safety, said Mayer. The AAMC is taking a comprehensive approach to enhancing quality and patient safety efforts.

The report mentions financial incentives available federally, from Titles VII and VIII of the Public Health Service Act, as well as on a state level. Because preventable medical errors are the eighth leading cause of death in the U.S., a case could be made for using federal funds to bolster graduate medical education requirements.

Another key theme found in the report is the need to launch intensive faculty training programs to ensure that they have the patient safety and communication skills necessary to teach graduate medical students.

"Not only do we need to reform the curriculum, we need to reform the faculty," said Leape. "We have to get them up-to-speed in safety, to learn the science so they can teach it, to learn to be team players, and most of all, to learn to be appropriate role models. Medical students learn the science of medicine in the classrooms and in the labs; they learn the practice of medication by emulating their professors. Therefore, every teacher must be the kind of physician we want our students to become."

To find the full report from the Lucian Leape Institute, including the 12 specific recommendations, visit www.npsf.org/LLI-Unmet-Needs-Report/.