Experts Available to Discuss Minimizing Medical Errors and Optimizing Patient Safety...

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Tue Jul 22, 2008 12:27pm EDT

Experts Available to Discuss Minimizing Medical Errors and Optimizing Patient Safety in Hospitals

--(Business Wire)--
ExpertSource:

   TOPIC: A recent study on patient safety in American hospitals,
conducted by HealthGrades, found more than 238,000 Medicare patients
died between 2004 and 2006 as a result of preventable medical errors,
according to an article by Newsweek. The article cites the four most
common ways medical care goes awry, and offers risk-reducing
suggestions. Some of the most common mistakes include medication
errors, poor communication between doctor and patient, falls and
infections, and surgical errors.

   EXPERTS: ExpertSource can offer several highly qualified experts
to comment on this story:

   Mike Reno, vice president at St. Luke's Episcopal Hospital, has
executive oversight and service line responsibility for the
cardiology, cardiovascular and neuroscience services, and is
administratively responsible for diagnostic and therapeutic imaging,
radiology and nuclear medicine. He oversees the physical medicine and
rehabilitation services, serving as the administrator for the 24-bed
Rehab hospital within a hospital. Mike also oversees the hospital's
support service operations, including facility master planning,
architecture and construction, clinical technology, parking and
transportation, food and nutrition, safety and security, environmental
services, mail and messenger services, facilities engineering and
building and grounds operations. Additionally, Mike co-chairs the
Patient Safety and Quality Committee, tasked with ensuring compliance
with various regulatory agencies, including the Joint Commission
Environment of Care Standards, serves as the hospital's Emergency
Management Coordinator and is the project executive for the Patient
Care Center capital building project and the executive sponsor for the
implementation of LEAN, the Toyota Production System, as the
hospital's standard operating procedure.

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PR Contact: Deb Eisenberg
301-523-9224
deisenberg1@comcast.net
*T

   James Parish joined RWD Technologies in 2000, and serves as
Executive Vice President of RWD's Performance Solutions group. Mr.
Parish's group provides clients with training and process improvement
solutions for lean manufacturing, back office, supply chain,
manufacturing, engineering, logistics, safety, and health and
environmental applications. Before assuming his current position, Mr.
Parish served as the manager of the ACTS Consortium workforce
development project, a member of the Governance Committee of Sigma
Learning (a Limited Liability Committee serving Delphi Corp.), and as
a departmental director. Prior to joining RWD Technologies, he was
vice president and general manager for U.S. Axle, Inc. He also held
various senior management positions for Diesel Technology Company
during its transition from a division of General Motors to a major
supplier of diesel fuel systems. Following five years as a co-op
student, Mr. Parish held progressively more responsible engineering
and engineering management responsibilities at General Motors. Mr.
Parish holds a bachelor's degree in Mechanical Engineering from GMI
Management and Engineering Institute and his M.B.A. from Grand Valley
State University.

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PR Contact: Deb Eisenberg
301-523-9224
deisenberg1@comcast.net
*T

   Gina Pugliese, RN, MS, is vice president of the Premier Safety
Institute, editor of its Safety Share online newsletter, and is
responsible for the overall content of the Safety Institute's Web
site. She is an associate faculty member of Rush University College of
Nursing and a member of the adjunct faculty of the University of
Illinois School of Public Health, Division of Epidemiology and
Biostatistics, in Chicago. In addition, she is the senior associate
editor of Infection Control and Hospital Epidemiology and serves on
the editorial board of the Joint Commission Journal on Quality
Improvement and Safety. She served as co-chair for 16 years and is
currently on the faculty of the international Healthcare Epidemiology
Training Program that is co-sponsored by the Society for Healthcare
Epidemiology of America (SHEA) and the Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention (CDC). For eight years, Pugliese was the director of safety
of the American Hospital Association (AHA).

   For more than 25 years, she has served in clinical, teaching, and
administrative positions in nursing, hospital administration, safety,
and infection control. She is the author of more than 130 publications
and has developed and/or served as faculty in over 400 national and
international educational conferences in 14 countries and 25 national
videotapes and teleconferences. Pugliese has served on a number of
national committees for JCAHO, CDC, FDA, Centers for Medicare and
Medicaid Services (CMS), and the Occupational Safety and Health
Administration (OSHA), Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality
(AHRQ) and the National Quality Forum (NQF) to assist in
guideline-setting and regulatory processes related to patient safety
and infection prevention and control. Pugliese is currently a member
of a technical advisory panel for the CMS National Surgical Care
Improvement Project (SCIP) and the NQF Voluntary Consensus Standards
for the Reporting of Healthcare-associated Infection Data. Pugliese
has received numerous honors for her work in healthcare epidemiology,
patient safety and infection prevention, including a special
recognition award from the U.S. Department of Labor in 1991, the AHA
Employee of the Year in 1992 and APIC's Carol DeMille Outstanding
Achievement Award in 2001. In 2005, the Gina Pugliese Scholarship was
established by SHEA for a clinician to attend each of the bi-annual
SHEA/CDC international Healthcare Epidemiology Training Courses.

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PR Contact: Alven Weil
704-733-5797
alven_weil@premierinc.com
www.premierinc.com/about/news
*T

   ExpertSource cannot guarantee the immediate availability of these
experts or their familiarity with this specific issue.

   ExpertSource provides academic and industry experts to the media
at no charge. Journalists are encouraged to submit queries to
ExpertSource when seeking experts on specific subjects. An online
registration form is available at http://www.businesswire.com/.

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Copyright Business Wire 2008
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