Reform of Public Service

This is the subject of a special survey in this weeks Economist. While looking at public services generally, criticizing (rightly in my opinion) the growth and low productivity of services worldwide, it has a specific mention of health. Well worth reading.

Amongst the figures given; "McKinsey points out that American spending on this has grown at an annual lick of 4.9% over the past 40 years, whereas GDP per person has grown by just 2.1%. Pessimists are convinced nothing can be done to restrain it. A refreshingly different perspective is provided by Sir John Oldham, a British doctor who is clinical lead for productivity in the National Health Service."
"America, which currently spends 16% of its GDP on health care is theoretically on track to spend 100% of its GDP on health care by 2065."

Think outside the box

An interesting blog post from Moss Kanter about innovation. Basically very few organization can shift their way of thinking from business as usual. This is a cause of great frustration for the visionaries and innovators within that organization. Great relevance to healthcare.

First Post

Welcome. The purpose of this blog is to share the latest happenings, events, news in the area of patient safety to an Irish audience. There are many healthcare workers interested in and committed to improving safety and quality in Irish healthcare, but they are faced with numerous problems in trying to develop their expertise and interest, including a disempowering management structure, lack of awareness of others in the system with similar interests and an absence of training in the area of the Science of Improvement.

I hope to post on a regular basis, and include news, links, ideas etc in order to stimulate discussion about patient safety.