In 2012, a program for children's hospitals in the U.S. and Canada launched to eliminate patient and employee harm.
The Children's Hospitals' Solutions for Patient Safety Network started in Ohio with a handful of children's hospitals. Hospitals share all their data and case studies around patient harm, including central line infection, unplanned extubations, adverse drug events and surgical site infections. The transparency allows hospitals to standardize processes and learn together.
"We agreed to never compete on safety," Stephen Muething, MD, chief quality officer at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, told Becker's. He served as the first clinical director of the network for seven years.
The network has grown from eight children's hospitals to 137.
In 2017, the program reported a 9%-71% reduction in eight harm conditions at 33 hospitals. It is estimated that more than 9,000 children were spared harm since 2012 and $148.5 million in healthcare spending was avoided.
"We've been trying to get an adult version of SPS going, but it hasn't quite caught fire yet," Dr. Meuthing said.