Value Based Health Care: Linking Finance and Quality

CHAPTER 6

THE COST OF SENTINEL EVENTS

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

• Explain the resources used and expenses incurred when there is a sentinel event

• Explain how incident analysis identifies gaps in the delivery of care

• Describe how to conduct a root cause analysis

• Explain how the never event campaign is improving patient safety and lowering costs

• Explain how errors can occur in a traditional hospital culture

Errors and mistakes are inevitable in health care. Particularly in today’s complex health care environment, with multiple caregivers treating increasingly elderly patients who have chronic diseases and multiple comorbidities, errors can be expected to occur. Therefore, an organization has to confront errors head on and challenge clinicians ...