Risk Management, Patient Safety & Quality

Catalog description

Students will utilize reading materials, case studies, hospital risk management scenarios and data sets provided in class to apply knowledge to specific RM and patient safety scenarios and to use critical thinking skills to solve problems. Through the readings and case study analysis students will learn to identify legal, ethical, administrative, compliance, risk management and patient safety issues and to reach resolutions for the problems presented, even when a clear legal response may not be available or in the best interests of the patient. We will be learning how to respond to a variety of risk management issues from the perspective of clinicians, lawyers, administrators, managers and patients and appreciate how events are perceived and managed. We will also discuss how these perceptions of key stakeholders are in conflict and how those conflicts can be managed. Finally, students will also learn how principles of risk management have changed since the 1998 IOM Report and how the changes in our current health care system will further challenge both patients and providers. This report called for increased focus on systemic failures and moving away from a culture of blame and shame to a culture of transparency and learning. With the passage of the ACA and not efforts to repeal and replace we will also discuss how risk management, safety and compliance are likely to further change as our health care delivery system evolves.