The buddy check is a procedure carried out by scuba divers using the buddy system where each dive buddy checks that the other's diving equipment is configured and functioning correctly just before the start of the dive. A study of pre-dive equipment checks done by individual divers showed that divers often fail to recognize common equipment faults. By checking each other's equipment as well as their own, it is thought to be more likely that these faults will be identified prior to the start of the dive. The correct use of a well designed written checklist is known to be more reliable, and is more likely to be used by professional divers, where it may be required by occupational health and safety legislation, and by technical divers, where the equipment checks are more complex.
A checklist is a type of job aid used in repetitive tasks to reduce failure by compensating for potential limits of human memory and attention. Checklists are used both to ensure that safety-critical system preparations are carried out completely and in the correct order, and in less critical applications to ensure that no step is left out of a procedure. they help to ensure consistency and completeness in carrying out a task. A basic example is the "to do list". A more advanced checklist would be a schedule, which lays out tasks to be done according to time of day or other factors, or a pre-flight checklist for an airliner, which should ensure a safe take-off.
A medical guideline is a document with the aim of guiding decisions and criteria regarding diagnosis, management, and treatment in specific areas of healthcare. Such documents have been in use for thousands of years during the entire history of medicine. However, in contrast to previous approaches, which were often based on tradition or authority, modern medical guidelines are based on an examination of current evidence within the paradigm of evidence-based medicine. They usually include summarized consensus statements on best practice in healthcare. A healthcare provider is obliged to know the medical guidelines of their profession, and has to decide whether to follow the recommendations of a guideline for an individual treatment.
Atul Atmaram Gawande is an American surgeon, writer, and public health researcher. He practices general and endocrine surgery at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts. He is a professor in the Department of Health Policy and Management at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and the Samuel O. Thier Professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School. In public health, he was the chairman of Ariadne Labs, a joint center for health systems innovation, and chairman of Lifebox, a nonprofit that works on reducing deaths in surgery globally. On June 20, 2018, Gawande was named the CEO of healthcare venture Haven, owned by Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway, and JP Morgan Chase and stepped down as CEO in May 2020, remaining as executive chairman while the organization sought a new CEO.
Ramesh Ponnuru is an American conservative thinker, political pundit, and journalist. He is the editor of National Review magazine, a contributing columnist for The Washington Post, and a contributing editor to the domestic policy journal National Affairs. He has been a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute since 2012.
"A Hard Day's Night" is the pilot episode and series premiere of the American television medical drama Grey's Anatomy, which first aired on March 27, 2005 on ABC. The episode introduces the main characters and surgical interns Meredith Grey, Cristina Yang, Izzie Stevens, George O'Malley, and Alex Karev, as they begin their journey into the world of surgery at Seattle Grace Hospital. Other key characters introduced in the episode include Derek Shepherd, Miranda Bailey, Richard Webber and Preston Burke.
Profile Books is a British independent book publishing firm founded in 1996. It publishes non-fiction subjects including history, biography, memoir, politics, current affairs, travel and popular science.
Peter J. Pronovost is Chief Quality and Transformation Officer at University Hospitals Cleveland Medical Center, the main affiliate of the Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine.
Jeffrey Bruce "Jeff" Skiles is a retired airline pilot for American Airlines. On January 15, 2009, he became known globally as first officer of US Airways Flight 1549, when he worked together with captain Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger to water land the aircraft on the Hudson River after the plane lost both of its engines. They were widely celebrated as heroes for landing the plane with no loss of life.
In aviation, a preflight checklist is a list of tasks that should be performed by pilots and aircrew prior to takeoff. Its purpose is to improve flight safety by ensuring that no important tasks are forgotten. Failure to correctly conduct a preflight check using a checklist is a major contributing factor to aircraft accidents.
"Death panel" is a political term that originated during the 2009 debate about federal health care legislation to cover the uninsured in the United States. Sarah Palin, former governor of Alaska and 2008 Republican vice presidential candidate, coined the term when she charged that proposed legislation would create a "death panel" of bureaucrats who would carry out triage, i.e. decide whether Americans—such as her elderly parents, or children with Down syndrome—were "worthy of medical care". Palin's claim has been referred to as the "death panel myth", as nothing in any proposed legislation would have led to individuals being judged to see if they were worthy of health care.
There were a number of different health care reforms proposed during the Obama administration. Key reforms address cost and coverage and include obesity, prevention and treatment of chronic conditions, defensive medicine or tort reform, incentives that reward more care instead of better care, redundant payment systems, tax policy, rationing, a shortage of doctors and nurses, intervention vs. hospice, fraud, and use of imaging technology, among others.
The World Health Organization (WHO) published the WHO Surgical Safety Checklist in 2008 in order to increase the safety of patients undergoing surgery. The checklist serves to remind the surgical team of important items to be performed before and after the surgical procedure in order to reduce adverse events such as surgical site infections or retained instruments. It is one affordable and sustainable tool for reducing deaths from surgery in low and middle income countries.
Yaga Venugopal Reddy is an Indian economist and a retired Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer of the 1964 batch belonging to Andhra Pradesh cadre. Reddy served as governor of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), India's central bank, from September 2003 until September 2008.
Unnecessary health care is health care provided with a higher volume or cost than is appropriate. In the United States, where health care costs are the highest as a percentage of GDP, overuse was the predominant factor in its expense, accounting for about a third of its health care spending in 2012.
Martin Adel Makary is a British-American surgeon, professor, author, and medical commentator. He practices surgical oncology and gastrointestinal laparoscopic surgery at the Johns Hopkins Hospital, is Mark Ravitch Chair in Gastrointestinal Surgery at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, and is the chief of Islet Transplant Surgery at Johns Hopkins.
Neel Shah is an American physician, Harvard University assistant professor, Chief Medical Officer of Maven Clinic, and founder of the nonprofit organizations Costs of Care and March for Moms. Shah is married to MIT Professor Julie Shah.
Complications: A Surgeon's Notes on an Imperfect Science is a nonfiction book collection of essays written by the American surgeon Atul Gawande. Gawande wrote this during his general surgery residency at Brigham and Women's Hospital and was published in 2002 by Picador. The book is divided into three sections: Fallibility, Mystery, and Uncertainty, all going in depth into the problems physicians may face when practicing a variety of procedures in medicine. Each of these sections puts forth different challenges doctors must face that make them imperfect and errant, resulting in the inevitable occurrence of errors.
Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End is a 2014 non-fiction book by American surgeon Atul Gawande. The book addresses end-of-life care, hospice care, and also contains Gawande's reflections and personal stories. He suggests that medical care should focus on well-being rather than survival. Being Mortal has won awards, appeared on lists of best books, and been featured in a documentary.
The Lifebox Foundation, commonly known as Lifebox, is a non-profit organization that improves the safety of surgery in low-income countries.
