The Batz Guide for Bedside Advocacy,"teaming Up for the Patient"

The Story: Every day in the United States an estimated 550 people die from preventable medical errors, which is approximately 200,000 people a year, making it the 3rd leading cause of death in the United States. (Healthgrades 2004) On April 14, my mom, Louise Batz, went to have knee replacement surgery. That night, a medical error caused Mom to sustain an injury from which she could not recover. She lost her life eleven days later. The Mission: The mission of the Louise H. Batz Patient Safety Foundation is to help prevent medical errors by ensuring that patients and families have the knowledge they need to promote a safe hospital experience for their loved ones and to support innovative advancements in patient safety. Our greatest hope is that families, patients, and caregivers will work together as a TEAM to improve safety in our hospitals. The Use of the Guide: Our hope is that you and your family can use this guide in order to improve the quality of your loved one's hospital stay. We hope that by using the guide, you will be better equipped to aid the care team in the reduction of adverse events. Organize your questions and concerns as soon as you learn about an upcoming surgery or procedure. This packet will be useful during pre-surgery appointments, during your time in the hospital, at home post-surgery and for follow up visits and appointments. We encourage you to include personal questions based on feelings or concerns and utilize the questions provided in the Batz Guide for Bedside Advocacy.What's in the Guide: In this guide you will find all sorts of tools that will help you in all aspects of your hospital stay. You will find places to store personal information such as medication logs, the names of your medical team, and surgery summaries; you will find information on who to contact in case of emergency, charts of who is in charge, and who to call to get things done; and you will find advice, definitions, must ask questions, and places to keep and store all of those little details that can and will help keep you or your loved one more safe.