Leah Binder

See the following -

Embarrassing New GAO Report On Hospital Safety Has Two Surprising Bright Spots

Leah Binder | Forbes | March 15, 2016

Hospitals are flummoxed by the problem of patient safety, according to a report issued by the Government Accounting Office (GAO) just in time for this week’s Patient Safety Awareness Week. Issued at the request of ranking members of the Senate Committee on Finance and Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), respectively, the report reveals three explanations on why hospitals find it so difficult to address patient safety. I am summarizing, but I am not exaggerating...

Read More »

Feds Move Into Digital Medicine, Face Doctor Backlash

Laura Ungar and Jayne O'Donnell | USA TODAY | February 1, 2015

"Physicians passionately despise their electronic health records," says Lexington, Ky., emergency physician Steven Stack, the American Medical Association's president-elect. "We use technology quickly when it works … Electronic health records don't work right now."

Read More »

How CMS Makes Quality Data Public While Still Keeping It Secret

Cheryl Clark | HealthLeaders Media | September 26, 2013

The federal government seems to want to keep safety data on eight hospital-acquired conditions (HACs) secret at the same time that it boasts how transparent it's being. Read More »

Progress In Health Care Is Still 'Excruciatingly Slow' Says Harvard Expert

Leah Binder | Forbes | February 20, 2014

I had the opportunity to interview one of the nation’s foremost experts on pay-for-performance and health care quality measurement, Harvard professor Ashish K. Jha, MD, MPH. His entertaining and insightful blog “An Ounce of Evidence“ tops my bookmarks.  He’s known in the business community for his forceful candor on the need for much more transparency and better payment systems in health care. [...] Read More »

The Third-Leading Cause Of Death Is Preventable, But Candidates Don't Mention It

Leah Binder | Forbes | October 26, 2016

It is more likely to kill you than terrorism. It has profoundly impacted virtually every American family. So this election year, why aren’t politicians at all levels of government talking about the third-leading cause of death in America—preventable errors in healthcare? The statistics are staggering: more than 500 patients per day are killed by errors, accidents and infections in hospitals alone. Medical errors kill more people annually than breast cancer, AIDS or drug overdoses...

Read More »

Why the Threatened AHRQ Is Vital to the Hospital Industry

Meg Bryant | Healthcare DIVE | April 13, 2017

The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) is on the chopping block — again — and supporters are gearing up for what could be their biggest fight yet to save the little-known agency. In his fiscal year 2018 budget proposal, President Donald Trump has proposed eliminating AHRQ’s funding and folding the agency into the National Institutes of Health, which itself is facing a proposed 18% cut to its current $31.7 billion budget, and a requested $1.2 billion cut in FY 2017 funding.

Read More »