Final Update On "Checklist"

In December I wrote about a government effort to block  the use of checklists in ICU's.

Yesterday, I received an e-mail from Robert M. Wachter, MD, Professor and Chief of the Division of Hospital Medicine UCSF Medical Center, headlined: "a happy ending to the checklist story (thanks for your help)

Wachter sent this link to a story on his website which explains that "The Office for Human Research Protections (OHRP) – part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services – has concluded that Michigan hospitals can continue implementing a checklist to reduce the rate of catheter-related infections in intensive care unit settings (ICUs) without falling under regulations governing human subjects research."

Wachter commented "I must admit, I didn’t hold out high hopes that a ragtag band of committed clinicians and other quality improvers could change federal policy. But we’ve done just that. If the Feds are capable of rectifying this mistake, who knows what might be next!

Indeed.

Comments

[Ken Houghton]

The link is missing it's ending.

http://the-hospitalist.org/blogs/wachters_world/archive/2008/02/16/the-checklist-saga-victory.aspx

Currently, you can just go to http://the-hospitalist.org/blogs/ and see it at the top.