I’m a retired neurologist who in 1984 tracked outcomes by hand, needing to know whom I should use to perform certain procedures based on those data.

When I read PeaceHealth Oregon Chief Hospital Executive Dr. Jim McGovern speaking about “reliable, high quality care” at RiverBend, I want a clear definition of reliability, and also high quality care, such as best practices, how often they are followed and what changes they have had.

I believe in access to timely care. But I do want a definition of what that actually means — data formatted with random samples using some measure of variability, probability values and levels of confidence if required.

I saw many patients in emergency departments in Tucson, Arizona, and now, being old with cancer, I worry about my quality of care, including whether I will have appropriate analgesia should I need it.

Here are a few additional quality of care definitions for RiverBend I would like to know values and trends for, both as a physician and now as a patient:

  • Wait time — average and median; histogram by hours waited; statistical significance used when comparing data with self or with other institutions.
  • Reasons why a patient in the emergency department is not moved when they could be: no bed available, no place to go, family not there to take the person, waiting for meds or paperwork to be finished.
  • Number of patients waiting in suboptimal places, and hours spent.

I once practiced and improved systems, including emergency care. I, like all of us, have a personal stake in well-defined and appropriately measured quality medical care, and assume that today, decades after my time on the stage, that all are handled better now.

I just worry that perhaps all aren’t handled better.

Michael S. Smith, M.D.
Eugene

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