Forum Health joins 5 Million Lives campaign

YOUNGSTOWN — Forum Health has joined the Institute for Healthcare Improvement’s 5 Million Lives, a national campaign to reduce incidents of medical harm in hospitals. The 5 Million Lives campaign asks hospitals to improve the care they provide to protect patients from 5 million incidents of medical harm in a 24-month period, ending Dec. 9, 2008.

The 5 Million Lives campaign builds upon the success of the 100,000 Lives campaign, in which 3,100 participating facilities (representing 75 percent of U.S. hospital beds,), including Forum Health, avoided unnecessary deaths by implementing evidence-based interventions and other improvement initiatives.

The interventions include:

Prevent Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus infection by implementing scientifically proven infection-control practices.

Reduce harm from high-alert medications, starting with a focus on anticoagulants, sedatives, narcotics and insulin.

Reduce surgical complications by implementing the changes in care recommended by the Surgical Care Improvement Project.

Prevent pressure ulcers by using science-based guidelines for prevention.

Deliver reliable, evidence-based care for congestive heart failure to reduce re-admission’s.

Deploy rapid response teams at the first sign of patient decline and before any catastrophic cardiac or respiratory event.

Deliver reliable, evidence-based care for acute myocardial infarction to prevent deaths from heart attack.

Prevent adverse drug events by reconciling patient medications at every transition point in care.

Prevent central line infections by implementing a series of interdependent, scientifically grounded steps.

Prevent surgical site infections by following a series of steps, including reliable, timely administration of correct perioperative antibiotics.

Prevent ventilator-associated pneumonia by implementing a series of interdependent, scientifically grounded steps.