“Plain English Please”

 April 9, 2012

 One of the keys to success in an advocacy, in my opinion, is the ability to keep the interested parties motivated at all levels, “leave no woman/man behind”! A good sense of humor helps too!

My first follower’s inquiry, “Plain English, please”!

My advocacy for the eradication of H.A.I. (Hospital Associated Infections) is supportive in nature with Veteran’s Hospital’s patient safety as my primary interest.

To help the Veteran’s the whole system needs to be fixed, the V.A. is watching the Department of Health and Human Services who is waiting for “best practices” to be developed in the 50 states and yes, currently, 50 states are going in 50 different directions and most of the studies are redundant. Here is a good description of H.A.I. and the current situation:

 http://www.hhs.gov/ash/initiatives/hai/index.html

 Meanwhile, some really good progress has been made and the system is flooded with money, study after study, when the money runs out what did we accomplish?

 My advocacy came to life due to an excellent article in the L.A. Times,

http://articles.latimes.com/2011/aug/23/business/la-fi-hospital-infections-20110823

I had always assumed that the healthcare system was best left to some wizard to fix, the “wizard” turned out to be an insurance company, cutting costs the way we do here in our humble shop:

"If we can improve the quality of care, that will translate into lower cost," Anthem President Pam Kehaly said. "These are real dollars."

Hey, wait a minute, our website has the had the phrase “using quality as a source of economy” for the past couple of decades, Pam Kehaly, President of Anthem Blue Cross, probably has never set foot in a “mom and pop” job shop but throw in the fact the we have been making parts for ventilators for the past decade or so made things more than a little interesting, “do our Veteran’s hospitals have the bennifit of this kind of motivation"?

There it is, "Plain English"!

Alright, job shop linguistics, K.I.S.S. (keep it simple, stupid), H.A.I., way too many issues, V.A.P., Ventilator Associated Pneumonia, one H.A.I., there is a hospital in Daily City, CA (S.F. Bay area) that has not had a V.A.P. event in four years according to U.S.D.H.H.S., my challenge is to get that hospital certified as a V.A.P. free facility by T.J.C., The Joint Commission, yes, the article you read about last month in A.A.R.P. magizine quoted

Mark R. Chassin, M.D., F.A.C.P., M.P. P., M.P.H. President, T.J.C.

http://www.jointcommission.org/standards_information/npsgs.aspx

concerning patient safty in our hospitals, T.J.C. is a large medical facility rating company, given a choice, would you rather go to a V.A.P. free rated facility, it should be more cost effective and how long do you think it would take other hospitals to learn how to compete?

    If you read up on how easy it is to prevent V.A.P. you will take action,"trust me",   the fact that so many people are loosing their lives to it is very distrubing.

If you are in California, send a letter of interest here as well:

Honorable California Senator Ed Hernandez

Chair, California Senate Health Committee
State Capitol , Room 4085
Sacramento, CA, 95814

 Looking for elected officals in the system, so am I, The President of the United States Barack Obama is a fan, United States Senator Dianne Feinstein is listining, Honorable California Assemblymember Katcho Achadjian has shared some kind words, Ms. Pam Kehaly, President, Anthem Blue Cross offered to come up and visit us, we passed, went down to Anthem, Lynne, my wife, and I had lunch with five of her top healthcare proffessionals,

"the hai-5"

114 years of healthcare service, “head west”, plain English!

The healthcare industry is very fragminted, concerning H.A.I. in our Vetran’s Hospitals, the Michigan system seems to be very proactive on the issue but for how long? Start with V.A.P., the proffessionals doing the current studies are good at studies, leadership is a different skillset in my opinion, the answers are there,be positive and above all, get involved, the victims are not “statics”, it is “you and I, your mom, dad, brother, sister and kids"!

More shop talk, “entropy”, we need “standards,” improvement is nice, improvement is not a “standered” in my opinion, write to Dr. Chassin at T.J.C.. and do not forget about your elected officals, they need your “support”!

My advocacy has been going for the past six months or so, I would love to tell you about all of the hardships involved, we all have a stake in this, all have been very kind watching me stumble through the development of my advocacy, "thank you"!

 What do I want, my advocacy is not about me, it is about patient safety in not only Veteran's Hospitals but the hospital you may visit some day. You will see some support in my writtings concerning Anthem Blue Cross, they are actually part of the solution, in my opinion, and have a vested interest in improving patient safety and providing affordable healthcare, that is their "mission", I have been following their contract negotiations around the country for the past six months, "they practice what they preach"! For those of you who do not know who works at Anthem Blue Cross, I would challenge you to make the effort to find out! For those of you who think bashing insurance providers will make our healthcare system more efficent, it has not worked so far, it is the equivalint of blaming your local gas station for the price of gas in my opinion!

 There is no "quick fix" but a V.A.P. free rating, you have to start somewhere in my opinion!


 This is a great country we live in, I thank the Veterans for that,our system only works if you participate in it but do be suppotive and patient, as I have said, all of the comments I have recieved from my efforts have been kind and supportive.

hai-5

Michael H. Slavinski