A new frontier in healthcare risk management: Working to reduce avoidable patient suffering

This article presents a new avenue for healthcare risk managers to drive improvement for patients and healthcare organizations alike: working to reduce avoidable patient suffering. It briefly describes the problem of patient suffering, differentiates between avoidable and unavoidable suffering, and suggests that common risk management tools can be used to tackle the problem. It also highlights a success story from one large health system.     

Working together,staying focused on our goals

When I was elected president of ASHRM for 2009, I accepted the honor as an opportunity to help ASHRM reach new heights. My goal is to support the objectives and goals consistent with the mission, values, and strategic direction of this organization and to do that with integrity through service, teamwork, and innovation. This is a challenging year for all of us individually, which by extension makes it a challenge for ASHRM. Staying focused on my goal will be difficult, but my intention is to do just that.