Bill for Reporting Medical Errors Clears Congress, President signed into law

from pa nurses enews:

bill for reporting medical errors clears congress

recently, by an overwhelming vote of 428-3, the house passed the compromise patient safety bill that the senate previously passed unanimously. president bush signed the bill called the patient safety and quality improvement act of 2005, was signed into law on july 29 (p.l. 109-41). the bill allows for health care providers to voluntarily send reports regarding medical errors and 'near errors' to patient safety organizations. these organizations will remove identifiable information from the reports and use them to develop information that will be returned to providers as a means of encouraging quality improvement. ana staff as a part of a coalition composed of the american medical association, the federation of american hospitals, jcaho and others, have been directing efforts at passage of this bill for a number of years. one critical aspect of the law is the extension of whistleblower protection to those who report healthcare errors by protecting them from adverse job actions.

in addition, the law will:

1. keep the reports and analyses of errors from use in court, without changing the rights or ability for injured patients to sue.

2. encourage hospitals and other healthcare facilities and professionals to share information about safety.

3. promote examination of reported information and dissemination of findings and recommendations to hospitals, doctors, and others in the health care system so that they can make systemic changes to reduce future occurrences of the same mistakes.

for more information please refer to www.capitolupdate.org our august 4 issue

8/11/2005 law not yet available for viewing from gpo.

check here http://thomas.loc.gov/bss/d109/d109laws.html next week.

i will check this out next week on that site. i tried to view the other,but, was an error and could not.

thanks for the info. i think it is not to soon.

Fixed the Capital Update link.

:)

Fixed the Capital Update link.

:)

Thanks very much. I am reviewing the med mal article and limiting fees for attorneys and awards for non-economic damages. This is interesting and helpful in my line of work.

capital update is a great example of the work ana is doing on behalf of american nurses.

don't forget to subscribe to capitol update, the american nurses association's free online legislative and political newsletter.

"as a capitol update subscriber you will get the latest news on the status of nursing issues in congress and in the agencies delivered directly to your in-box twice a month."

capital update is a great example of the work ana is doing on behalf of american nurses.

don't forget to subscribe to capitol update, the american nurses association's free online legislative and political newsletter.

"as a capitol update subscriber you will get the latest news on the status of nursing issues in congress and in the agencies delivered directly to your in-box twice a month."

thank you. i just subscribed.