Humana Supports Leapfrog Group’s Efforts

Humana, once again, is calling on hospitals that participate in its network to respond to the survey on hospital safety practices posted by The Leapfrog Group at www.leapfroggroup.org.

The Leapfrog Group — now with a membership approaching 150 large businesses representing more than a third of the privately insured people in the United States — wants to help employees make decisions about where they get their care. It is focused on creating positive rewards for hospitals that adopt the standards, without being confrontational or attempting to regulate what hospitals do.

The health care purchaser coalition that seeks to improve patient safety and reduce preventable medical mistakes in U.S. hospitals is making progress and getting the attention of both the health care community and consumers. The Leapfrog Group, established in 2000 by the Business Roundtable, was formed largely in response to a 1999 Institute of Medicine report, “To Err Is Human,” that claimed that more than 98,000 preventable medical errors occur each year in hospitals.

“Humana supports the Leapfrog initiative and is making the information available to our members through a secure section on our Web site,” said Tom Granatir, Humana’s senior advisor for health plan policy.

Humana is encouraging hospitals to respond to the survey so that employees who work for Leapfrog companies and are seeking information about hospital care will know what hospitals are doing to improve quality and safety, said Granatir.

Humana recognizes that hospitals already do many things to address the safety concerns of The Leapfrog Group and its employees. The revised survey is designed to enable hospitals to show the progress that they are making and to add other information about what they do to improve patient safety. Hospitals can also enter their Web addresses to bring interested parties back to their Web sites to learn more about their hospital and its safety programs.

“If a hospital responded to the survey prior to May 2003,” said Granatir, “we encourage hospital leadership to revisit the site and submit new information on the revised survey.” The Leapfrog Group continues to refine its definitions of the safety standards to give hospitals more credit for progress toward the goals and will soon be adding questions about other safety practices specified by the National Quality Forum, a national consensus body on health care performance measurement.

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