A message from Timothy J. Babineau, MD, to our patients, their families and the community.

On October 22, a wrong site surgery occurred at Rhode Island Hospital. The Rhode Island Department of Health issued a fine and a compliance order which outlines a series of actions Rhode Island Hospital must take in the upcoming weeks. In response, we have requested a meeting with state officials to discuss this matter. Working with our colleagues at the Department of Health, all of us at Rhode Island Hospital will ensure that any future actions advance our goal of reducing the likelihood of such events.

I know that many of you are disheartened by this incident, and many are troubled by it, as are we. This error should not have happened. We take this issue extremely seriously and over the past several months have worked diligently to reduce the chance of errors reaching our patients. This work goes on.

My leadership team and I are committed to decreasing the frequency of all medical errors—and I want you to know that Rhode Island Hospital is not alone in this effort. Surgical errors are an issue and a priority not only here but nationwide—for despite our best efforts, wrong site surgical errors continue to occur at hospitals all over this country at a rate of nearly 40 per week.

In July 2009, Rhode Island Hospital and Newport Hospital began work with The Joint Commission Center for Transforming Healthcare on a surgical site protocol project. That effort has already produced several key recommendations focused on caregivers being in the right roles and performing the right tasks in order to reduce the risk of wrong site surgery.

We will continue to work tirelessly to further increase patient safety in our operating rooms. It is just one of our many patient safety programs and initiatives throughout the hospital and the entire Lifespan health system. Among them are: Lifelinks, our electronic patient record; medication administration safety; and the ICU Collaborative.

Rhode Island Hospital has a long history of providing extraordinary care to the people of our region. The public places an enormous amount of trust in us and we take the trust very seriously. We work daily to maintain that trust, now and into the future.

In the steadfast pursuit of excellence, I remain,

Sincerely yours,

Timothy J. Babineau, MD
President and Chief Executive Officer
Rhode Island Hospital & The Miriam Hospital

Read the Fall 2009 message

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