About
COVID-19 demonstrated a pressing need to improve safety in our health system. Prior to the pandemic, preventable medical error caused an estimated 250,000 deaths a year in the U.S., ranking as the 3rd leading cause of death. Despite earlier disclosures of this tragedy, we have not made significant progress over the past 20 years.
Previous efforts to improve processes and change behavior at healthcare’s frontline have been decentralized and have not been successful. The primary reason is that these improvements do not have one federal agency to independently determine why the adverse events are occurring and create solutions to prevent recurrence.
Meanwhile, other industries have seen dramatic improvements in safety. Transportation, for instance, benefits from having that single federal agency with a clear, defined, and focused mission—the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB). The NTSB studies the accidents, mishaps, and close calls with the greatest potential for harm. The NTSB’s interdisciplinary teams then propose solutions and corrective actions to prevent future injury. The vast majority of NTSB solutions have become standard practice and widely adopted, producing exceptional levels of safety and saving lives.
A proposed federal independent agency, the National Patient Safety Board (NPSB), would model the NTSB within health care. The NPSB would support agencies in monitoring and anticipating adverse events with artificial intelligence, conduct studies, create recommendations and solutions to prevent medical error, and leverage existing systems and bring key learnings into practice.
In early 2021, a growing coalition of leading healthcare organizations and experts began to advance and call for the creation of the NPSB. The following organizations are on board with the NPSB.
We invite you to Get On Board with us today. Like the NTSB, the NPSB will save lives.
NPSB Advocacy Coalition Members
- AARP Public Policy Institute
- ABIM Foundation
- Ariadne Labs
- athenahealth
- Avkin
- BETA Healthcare Group
- Business Group on Health
- Carilion Clinic
- Carrum Health
- Children’s Hospitals’ Solutions for Patient Safety (SPS)
- Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center
- Civitas Networks for Health
- Comagine Health
- Consumer Health Ratings
- Dartmouth-Hitchcock
- ECRI
- Families USA
- Healthcare Council of Western PA
- HealthySimulation.com
- HR Policy Association
- IHI Lucian Leape Institute
- Institute for Healthcare Improvement
- Jensen Hughes
- Jewish Healthcare Foundation
- John D. Stoeckle Center for Primary Care Innovation, Division of General Internal Medicine, Massachusetts General Hospital
- Johns Hopkins Armstrong Institute for Patient Safety and Quality
- Life Laboratory
- Louisiana Health Care Quality Forum
- Marshfield Clinic Health System
- MD Anderson Cancer Center
- MedStar Health
- Meridian Healthcare Consulting
- Methodist Le Bonheur Healthcare
- Mothers Against Medical Error
- National Alliance of Healthcare Purchaser Coalitions
- National Association for Healthcare Quality (NAHQ)
- National Perinatal Information Center (NPIC)
- National Quality Forum
- National Retail Federation
- Network for Excellence in Health Innovation (NEHI)
- Nile’s Project
- Patient Safety Action Network
- Patient Safety Movement Foundation
- Patients for Patient Safety US
- Pegwin
- Penobscot Community Health Care (PCHC)
- Pittsburgh Regional Health Initiative
- Project Patient Care
- Project Process
- Purchaser Business Group on Health
- Quality and Safety First
- Resilient Cognitive Solutions (RCS)
- Safe Care Campaign
- SEIU Healthcare Pennsylvania
- Sepsis Alliance
- St. Clair Health
- Stratis Health
- Synensys
- The John A. Hartford Foundation
- The ERISA Industry Committee (ERIC)
- The Leapfrog Group
- The University of Vermont Health Network
- University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine
- Value Capture, LLC
- Verily Life Sciences
- Virginia Mason Franciscan Health
- Washington Advocates for Patient Safety
- Washington Patient Safety Coalition