Push for patient safety honors writer
More than nine years after Boston Globe health columnist Betsy Lehman died from a chemotherapy overdose, state officials will memorialize her today by opening a center dedicated to reducing medical errors.
The long-planned center is designed to coordinate patient safety efforts by state and private health agencies and to educate health-care providers about the best ways to prevent errors. It will be located in the Department of Public Health and headed by Nancy Ridley, an assistant commissioner who has worked extensively on patient safety.
In conjunction with the center, the state will appoint an ombudsman to help patients and their families who believe they have been victims of a medical error. The person hired for the position, which is modeled on the state's managed-care ombudsman, will help patients file complaints and mediate conflicts with health-care providers over medical errors, according to Christine Ferguson, commissioner of public health.
"We are going to go great guns and pursue this issue and get the rate of medical errors down and make Massachusetts number one in the country for patient safety," said Ferguson.
Lehman's death in December 1994 at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute focused national attention on the problem of fatal medical errors. A 1999 landmark report from the national Institute of Medicine, which estimated that medical errors kill between 44,000 and 98,000 hospitalized patients a year, began with a reference to Lehman's death.
"It is most definitely a tribute to Betsy that we are all so focused on this issue," said Ferguson. "The columns she did and the awareness she brought to health issues is something we hope to continue here."
Four years ago, state Senator Richard T. Moore proposed legislation establishing the Betsy Lehman Center for Patient Safety and Medical Error Reduction to collect and publicize reports of medical errors and to hold health facilities and medical professionals accountable. But some doctors, lawyers, and hospitals objected to the reach of the proposed center and the bill was sidetracked.
A weakened center, designed to serve as a clearinghouse, was signed into law in 2002, but funding was eliminated in the ensuing state budget crisis. Now, Ferguson said, she has cobbled together $200,000 from the state's health-care quality trust fund to launch the center, which she called "an umbrella organization for all the safety initiatives we have."
Ridley hopes to secure federal grants to enlarge the budget in coming years.
"Up until now, it's been symbolic," said Dr. Lucian Leape, a specialist on medical errors and an adjunct professor at the Harvard School of Public Health. "The fact that they're willing to start funding is a very encouraging sign."
In the interim, many hospitals, including Dana-Farber, have initiated strong safety programs of their own. Health professionals and advocates formed the Massachusetts Coalition for the Prevention of Medical Errors, and the Department of Public Health won a $4.5 million federal grant to improve reporting and prevention efforts.
"The center will be a way to focus it all," said Moore. "We've got a lot of folks with good intentions who need those intentions focused and turned into real progress."
Lehman's mother, Mildred, called today's planned dedication of the center "an awakening" for the state and said she believed the center could serve "as a beacon for patient safety."
Alice Dembner can be reached at Dembner@globe.com. 
