Hospital Safety

What's New

A ground-breaking report released by the Pennsylvania Health Care Cost Containment Council shows that Pennsylvania hospitals reported more than 11,600 patients got infections in 2004 while seeking medical care. These infections—often the result of inadequate sanitary practices or failure to use effective prevention procedures—led to the death of 1,793 patients in the state. Read the press release.

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For Safer Hospitals

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Overview

The Centers for Disease Control estimates that 90,000 patients die every year due to infections acquired at hospitals.

Yet many states do not have laws on the books requiring hospitals to report how many patients get infections at their facilities as a result of inadequate sanitary practices or procedures. Letting the public know which hospitals have the best or worst infection rates allows patients to make informed choices about where to seek treatment, and pressures hospitals to improve their practices.

RIPIRG is working with Consumers Union—the publisher of Consumer Reports—to keep pressure on hospitals to comply with existing laws and is urging other states to pass similar laws.

While the hospital should be a place of healing, lax safety precautions and improper cleaning leave many at risk. RIPIRG is working to make hospitals come clean with their record of hospital-aquired infections.