(as of May 2006)
Remaking American Medicine…Health Care for the 21st Century, a four-part television series intended for broadcast on PBS in October 2006, will tell stories of change. The goal is to inspire and empower viewers, both members of the general public and health care professionals, to join in efforts to transform American health care.
Drawing on unprecedented access to health care institutions across the nation, the series will present detailed and emotionally engaging profiles of individuals struggling to fix our broken health care system. The stories will be told through the eyes of doctors, nurses, administrators and patients, showing their struggles, their setbacks and their victories.
Program One - “Silent Killer” -- Every year at least 98,000 Americans are killed – and countless more are injured – as a result of medical errors. This program begins by profiling the efforts of Sorrel King, whose 18-month-old daughter died at one of the most respected hospitals in the world, Johns Hopkins. King has gone from grieving victim to engaged activist, partnering with Johns Hopkins to make safety a top priority at the institution. Now she has joined forces with Dr. Donald Berwick, a nationally recognized patient safety advocate, to save 100,000 lives in American hospitals.
Program Two - “First Do No Harm” -- This program focuses on the impact of hospital-acquired infections and medical errors in two institutions, and follows the efforts of physicians who are challenging their colleagues to live up to their oath to “First Do No Harm.” In Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Chief of Medicine Dr. Richard Shannon is confronting an epidemic of hospital-acquired infections that are shattering the lives of their victims. Hackensack University Medical Center in New Jersey is engaged in an effort to completely transform the way the institution delivers care. The goal in both hospitals is to ensure that the people trusted to provide safe and effective medical treatment do not harm patients.
Program Three - “The Stealth Epidemic” -- Chronic diseases, like diabetes and congestive heart failure, affect nearly 100 million Americans, and treatment of these illnesses consumes nearly 70 percent of all health care resources. Yet doctors are often unable to prevent needless suffering or even death, and these failures are threatening the viability of our entire health care system. This program looks at groundbreaking efforts in two very different communities -- Los Angeles and Whatcom County in the state of Washington -- that are fundamentally transforming the physician-patient relationship … and offer a glimmer of hope for patients across the country who are struggling with their chronic conditions.
Program Four - “Hand in Hand” -- As medicine continues to become more and more technologically sophisticated and the systems that deliver medical care become more complex, the relationship between providers and patients and their families is more important than ever. This final program tells the story of patients and families who have formed a unique bond in a teaching hospital in Augusta, Georgia to transform the institution into a nationally recognized facility, where partnership is a guiding vision to the care it delivers.
An independent advisory panel of experts has been assembled to provide advice and consultation to Crosskeys Media for the series. The group is comprised of distinguished scholars, quality improvement leaders and individuals with years of experience in the health care system. The panel is playing a key role in reviewing and commenting upon the editorial content of the series.
Dr. Paul Batalden is Professor of Pediatrics and Community Medicine at Dartmouth Medical School and is Director of Health Care Improvement Leadership Development at the Center for the Evaluative Clinical Sciences.
Dr. Donald Berwick is President and CEO of the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI). Dr. Berwick is Clinical Professor of Pediatrics and Health Care Policy at Harvard Medical School. He is Chair of the National Advisory Council of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, as well as an elected member of the Institute of Medicine.
Dr. Tina Castañares is a practicing family physician, health care administrator and private consultant with a special interest in the uninsured and underserved. A staff physician at Providence Hood River Memorial Hospital and Medical Director of La Clinica del Cariño Family Health Care Center in Hood River, Oregon, she was one of the original eleven members of the Oregon Health Services Commission.
Dr. Carolyn M. Clancy serves as Director, Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ). Dr. Clancy is a general internist and health services researcher, and a graduate of Boston College and the University of Massachusetts Medical School.
Dr. Janet Corrigan is the President and CEO of the National Quality Forum, which announced in February 2006 its merger with the National Committee for Quality Health Care. Dr. Corrigan was the former Director of the Board on Health Care Services at the Institute of Medicine (IOM), which is responsible for projects relating to health care quality, safety, insurance and benefits coverage, organization, delivery and financing.
Dr. Charles Francis is President of the Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science, a private academic institution located in South Central Los Angeles. Prior to his present position, he served as Professor of Clinical Medicine, College of Physicians and Surgeons at Columbia University, and Chairman of the Department of Medicine at the Harlem Hospital Center.
Dr. Howard Hiatt is Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and Senior Physician at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital. During the course of his long and distinguished career, he was the first Hermann L. Blumgart Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and Physician-in-Chief at Beth Israel Hospital. He also served as Dean of the Harvard School of Public Health from 1972 to 1984.
Dr. Brent James is Vice President, Medical Research and Continuing Medical Education at Intermountain Health Care (IHC). He is also Executive Director of the IHC Institute for Health Care Delivery Research, which trains community physician leaders, clinical team members and administrators to conduct state-of-the-art practice improvement projects utilizing quality improvement methods to manage and integrate clinical processes.
Dr. David Lansky is the Senior Director, Health Program and Executive Director, Personal Health Technology Initiative for the Markle Foundation. Prior to this position, Dr. Lansky served as the Foundation for Accountability (FACCT) president from its inception in 1995. For more than twenty years, Lansky has been a proponent of a more responsive and accountable health care system.
Dr. David Leach is Executive Director of the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME). The mission of ACGME is to improve the quality of health care in the United States by ensuring and improving the quality of graduate education experiences for physicians in training. Dr. Leach previously served as director of medical education at the Henry Ford Health System in Detroit, Michigan.
Dr. Kate Lorig is the Director of the Stanford Patient Education Research Center. Dr. Lorig is a Professor of Medicine in the Stanford School of Medicine. She earned her bachelors degree in nursing at Boston University, and her masters and doctorate of public health in health education at the University of California, Berkeley.
Dr. Joseph Newhouse is the John D. MacArthur Professor of Health Policy and Management at Harvard University, Director of the Division of Health Policy Research Education, Chair of the Committee on Higher Degrees in Health Policy, and Director of the Interfaculty Initiative in Health Policy. He is a member of the faculties of the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard Medical School, the Harvard School of Public Health, and the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, as well as a Faculty Research Associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research.
Dr. Shelia Ryan is Professor and the Charlotte Peck Lienemann and Distinguished Alumni Chair and Director of International Programs in nursing at the University of Nebraska Medical Center College of Nursing in Omaha, Nebraska. Dr. Ryan serves on the governing board of AIHA, the American International Health Alliance, Inc. and recently completed board service for IHI, Institute for Healthcare Improvement, and the Robert Wood Johnson/Institute of Medicine Health Policy Fellow Selection Committee.
Mr. Pete Velez is a senior executive with demonstrated achievement in health care management, and has been a longstanding proponent of quality health care for all New Yorkers. He has had a 27-year career with the New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation (HHC). During that time he has kept pace with the changes in the health care industry, and assisted the organization in positioning itself to be competitive with other providers.
Dr. Ed Wagner is a general internist/epidemiologist and Director of the W.A. MacColl Institute for Healthcare Innovation at the Center for Health Studies, Group Health Cooperative of Puget Sound. He is also Professor of Health Services at the University of Washington School of Public Health and Community Medicine.
