Roadmap for Transforming Medical Liability and Improving
Patient Safety in Massachusetts
March 15, 2011
MMS Headquarters, Waltham
Alan Woodward, MD
Emergency physician, consultant and former President
of the Massachusetts Medical Society
Dr. Woodward has been recognized as a trailblazer for
emergency medicine in Massachusetts. A committed patient advocate,
he has worked tirelessly to improve access to high-quality
emergency care and to enhance public health. Currently he
pursues his interests in public health, health policy including
liability reform and sits on numerous healthcare related boards,
local and State committees, and on the Massachusetts Public Health
Council. In addition he has been active in organized medicine
at the local, district, state and national levels. Dr. Woodward
also co-chairs the State's Boarding and Patient Flow Task Force
with the Commissioner of Public Health.
Richard Boothman, JD
Chief Risk Officer at the University of Michigan
Healthcare System
An accomplished trial lawyer in Michigan and Ohio, Mr.
Boothman spent 22 years in private practice defending individual
doctors, professional groups and a wide range of health systems. He
then left private practice to join the University of Michigan
Health System, where he implemented a pro active and principled
approach to health system claims. Mr. Boothman was responsible for
the design and implementation of an innovative approach to medical
errors, mishaps, and near-misses at UMHS. He sits on the Board of
Governors for the National Patient Safety Foundation and the Board
of Directors for the Michigan Hospital Association Patient Safety
Organization. He has consulted for many academic and non-academic
health care systems and hospitals.
Kenneth Sands, MD, MPH
Senior Vice President for Health Care Quality and
Director of the Silverman Institute for Health Care Quality and
Safety at BIDMC
Dr. Sands was the Hospital Epidemiologist at BIDMC for six
years until assuming his current role in 1999. He has a continued
research interest in patient safety and complications of
hospitalization. He holds a substantial leadership position in the
field of quality improvement, and has made significant
contributions and impact on a national and international level. He
has been the principal driver of the BIDMC program for hospital
monitoring and transparent reporting on quality and safety that is
notable for the degree to which information is accessible and
understandable to patients and the public at large. He has served
as principal investigator on this study.
Michelle Mello, JD, PhD
Professor of Law and Public Health at the
Harvard School of Public Health
Dr. Mello is trained in law and health services research and
her work focuses on empirical investigations of health law issues.
The primary focus of her research for the past decade has been
medical malpractice. She has completed a number of original
empirical studies of tort reforms, the performance of the medical
liability system, and effects of the liability environment on the
quality and availability of health care, and is currently
conducting two studies of innovative reform proposals (health
courts and disclosure-and-offer programs) under grants from the
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. She has advised the Obama
administration, a number of state and federal legislations, and
several state commissions on medical liability reform issues.
Sigall K. Bell, MD
Infectious Disease physician at Beth Israel Deaconess
Medical Center and Professor of Medicine at the Harvard School of
Medicine
Dr Bell is an Assistant Professor of Medicine at Harvard
Medical School and a member of the Division of Infectious Diseases
at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston. Her
academic interests focus on fostering humanism in patient care
through the study of medical culture, the patient experience, and
improving communication after harmful events. Her work in medical
education can be found in Academic Medicine, the New England
Journal of Medicine, and the New York Times. She co-developed a
DVD-based curriculum addressing the human dimension of medical
error drawing on the documentary film "When Things Go Wrong: Voices
of Patients and Families" with Dr Tom Delbanco and others.
Peter Smulowitz, MD, MPH
Peter B. Smulowitz, MD, MPH is a practicing emergency
physician at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston and
Beth Israel Deaconess Needham, and a faculty member at Harvard
Medical School. He received his Masters in Public Health from
the Harvard School of Public Health, and worked previously as
health policy fellow for the Massachusetts State Senate Committee
on Health Care Financing, where he completed a white paper
outlining the benefits of a Disclosure and Offer program. Dr.
Smulowitz's major academic interests include medical liability
reform and evaluating the outcome of Massachusetts' health care
reform.
Linda Kenney
President/Executive Director of Medically Induced
Trauma Support Services (MITSS)
Linda Kenney founded MITSS in 2002 as the result of a personal
experience with an adverse medical event, when she identified the
need for support services in cases of adverse events and outlined
an agenda for change. Since that time, she has been a
tireless activist for patient, family, and clinician rights.
She has become a nationally and internationally recognized leader
in the patient safety movement and speaks regularly at healthcare
conferences and forums. She has authored and contributed to a
number of publications on topics including the emotional impact of
adverse events on patients, families, and clinicians.
Frederick van Pelt, MD, MBA
Director, Global Program, Partners Harvard Medical
International
Dr. Rick van Pelt works on programs focused on quality
improvement and patient safety. He brings to these collaborations a
rich background in the delivery of acute care, perioperative, and
surgical and minimally invasive care services, as well as expertise
in process improvement and change management. Prior to joining
PHMI, Dr. van Pelt served in both clinical and administrative roles
in the anesthesia department of the Brigham & Women's Hospital.
He is a co-founder of the Clinician Peer Support Service at the
Brigham, a service dedicated to providing support to care providers
following adverse medical events, and is the former Chairman of the
Board for Medically Induced Trauma Support Services (MITSS).
