Tom Milam recently sent me this excellent podcast from Relentless Healthcare Value which led to this post. The picture above is of one of my heroes, W. Edwards Deming who led the Japanese car quality revolution. When I was a child, most automobiles lasted for about 100,000 miles. I am still driving a Honda CRV that has over 200,000 miles on it. No problem. Automobiles are better today because of quality improvement.
Bill: I think this is a theme that you should continue to dig into deeply, namely how the US health care system abandoned Deming’s methods for quality improvement, continuous quality improvement. You might examine the role of the Institute for Quality Improvement, IHI, founded and led by Donald Berwick, and its initial successes and then demise as health care provider organizations strayed away from this proven method. It’s a tragic story of for-profit medicine taking over from a model that still had public health as an element of its principles and goals. You are well positioned to write on this topic and bring it to bear on OMT.
Thanks David. You are right. I was as excited when I heard about the Deming method as I was about tactics lag technology. I could see how his approach could apply to chronic illness. It appears that you are more deeply knowledgable about this history than I am. If you have specific sources I should examine, I will do that. Any insights you have are appreciated.
Well, Bill, I suggest you hook up with the IHI folks, and Donald Berwick in particular. Interview him, and ask him the important questions. You have the credibility and integrity to do so, as do few physicians.
Bill: I think this is a theme that you should continue to dig into deeply, namely how the US health care system abandoned Deming’s methods for quality improvement, continuous quality improvement. You might examine the role of the Institute for Quality Improvement, IHI, founded and led by Donald Berwick, and its initial successes and then demise as health care provider organizations strayed away from this proven method. It’s a tragic story of for-profit medicine taking over from a model that still had public health as an element of its principles and goals. You are well positioned to write on this topic and bring it to bear on OMT.
Thanks David. You are right. I was as excited when I heard about the Deming method as I was about tactics lag technology. I could see how his approach could apply to chronic illness. It appears that you are more deeply knowledgable about this history than I am. If you have specific sources I should examine, I will do that. Any insights you have are appreciated.
Well, Bill, I suggest you hook up with the IHI folks, and Donald Berwick in particular. Interview him, and ask him the important questions. You have the credibility and integrity to do so, as do few physicians.
Thanks David
Great post Bill, eager to develop more protocols around advanced primary care that incorporate these principles and generate the needed outcomes.