Safer hospitals could save $1. 5b a year

AAPThe West Australian Safer hospitals could prevent patients suffering complications and save Australia’s health system $1.5 billion a year, a new report has found. One in nine Australians

who go into hospital experience a complication, which costs public hospitals more than $4 billion a year and costs private hospitals more than $1 billion, according to the Grattan Institute.

But 250,000 patients could be saved from complications annually if all hospitals improved their safety measures to be in line with the safest 10 per cent, a new report from the policy think

tank shows. That would save the health system a cool $1.5 billion annually. The Grattan Institute’s Stephen Duckett says the figures show Australia’s hospital accreditation system needs a

makeover. Instead of a “one size fits all” system, accreditation should be based on measurable safety outcomes tailored to each hospital, he said. “Hospitals would no longer be spruced up

for a once-a-year visit by accreditation inspectors,” the institute’s health program director said in a statement. “Instead, surveyors would conduct safety tests without notice, but

concentrate on helping hospitals to give safer care.” The policy body is encouraging state government to make sure public hospitals know their bottom line will be improved if they are safer.

Based on its analysis of the nation’s 20 largest public hospitals, complications cost hospitals about three times what they receive in extra revenue for treating a sicker patient. 19-08-18

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