Global health care to be analyzed and tested

Joint Commission International (JCI) wants to “isolate the key risks” of global health care, said Sherry Kaufield, Executive Director of International Services for JCI.

The purpose of the JCI news conference was to announce the unveiling of Essential, a new program designed to assist health care internationally utilizing worldwide standards. David Jaimovich, Chief Medical Officer at JCI, said these standards are “not the U.S. standards,” but “comparable.”

President and CEO of JCI Karen Timmons said there are five risk areas JCI will look at in determining the health care in different countries and regions. The risk areas are leadership process and accountability, competent and capable workforce, safe environment for staff and patients, clinical care of patients, and improvement of quality and safety. JCI has determined ten criterion for each of these risk areas in order to determine the quality of health care globally.

Timmons said JCI can provide “educational assistance” to nations around the world in improving their health care. She also said that since many nations don’t have enough resources to provide adequate health care, JCI can help make health care “less expensive.”

In addition, Timmons added that the need to improve health care around the world is immense. Worldwide, one million people die from surgery complications each year, according to Timmons. She said that one out of every ten patients are harmed as a result of a medical error.