Links and Further Reading
There are many organizations pioneering the way to safer health care for all. In this section of our website, you can browse categories to help you more easily find an organization to fit your specific needs. This is by no means an all-encompassing list, but should serve as a starting point for gathering information.
Below are links to governmental and nongovernmental organizations that offer robust health care resources for consumers. Also see the links at the right, which deal with specific areas of patient safety.
Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ):
AHRQ is a government agency with a mission to improve the quality, safety, efficiency, and effectiveness of health care for all Americans. Information from AHRQ’s research helps people make more informed decisions and improve the quality of health care services. Consumers and patients can find information on the AHRQ website on how to stay healthy, choose quality care, navigate the health care system and understand diseases and medical conditions. AHRQ’s focus areas are:
- Comparing the effectiveness of treatments
- Health information technology
- Prevention and care management
- Health care value
Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC):
The CDC is a government-funded organization dedicated to protecting health and promoting quality of life through prevention and control of disease, injury, and disability. For more than 60 years, the CDC has collaborated with its partners throughout the nation and around the world in order to better:
- Monitor health
- Detect and investigate health problems
- Conduct research to enhance prevention
- Develop and advocate sound public health policies
- Implement prevention strategies
- Promote healthy behaviors
- Foster safe and healthful environments
- Provide leadership and training
ECRI Institute:
https://www.ecri.org/Patients/Pages/default.aspx
For more than 40 years, ECRI Institute, a nonprofit organization, has been dedicated to bringing the discipline of applied scientific research to discover which medical procedures, devices, drugs, and processes are best, all to help to improve patient care. ECRI Institute believes that patients and families deserve access to reliable, scientifically valid medical information and the patient section of their website provides a host of resources and guides to educate and empower patients and their families, such as:
- Comparative Effectiveness Resource Center
- Patient Safety Blog–Posts for Patients
- Patient Safety Center
- Patient Resources
Partnership for Patients:
http://www.healthcare.gov/compare/partnership-for-patients
The Partnership for Patients: Better Care, Lower Costs, a new public-private partnership, was launched by the US Department of Health and Human Services and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to help improve the quality, safety, and affordability of health care. The Partnership for Patients brings together leaders of major hospitals, employers, physicians, nurses, and patient advocates along with state and federal governments in a shared effort to make hospital care safer, more reliable, and less costly. Although the aim is to reduce all causes of harm in the health care system, two top goals are to keep patients from getting injured or sicker and to help patients heal without complication.
The Joint Commission:
http://www.jointcommission.org/general_public.aspx
The Joint Commission is an independent, not-for-profit organization that accredits and certifies more than 19,000 health care organizations and programs in the United States. Their mission is to continuously improve health care for the public, in collaboration with other stakeholders, by evaluating health care organizations and inspiring them to excel in providing safe and effective care of the highest quality and value. Patients and consumers can find valuable information in the form of guides, videos, and literature on their page for the general public.
World Health Organization (WHO):
WHO is the directing and coordinating authority for health within the United Nations system. It is responsible for providing leadership on global health matters, shaping the health research agenda, setting norms and standards, articulating evidence-based policy options, providing technical support to countries, and monitoring and assessing health trends. Rather than having a page specifically directed toward patients or families, WHO organizes their resource information by health topic.
