|
|
|
COMMON GOOD AND ROBERT WOOD JOHNSON FOUNDATION TO EXPAND INITIATIVE TO PROMOTE HEALTH COURTS
New State-By-State Outreach Effort Features Collaboration With Harvard School of Public Health and Other Academic Researchers
New York, NY -- February 20, 2007 -- Common Good, the national nonpartisan legal reform coalition, has been awarded a two-year grant of nearly $1 million from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) to promote the creation of special health courts to handle medical injury disputes in six states. The new project builds on a previous RWJF-funded project by Common Good and the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) to design a prototype for special health courts.
Common Good champions health courts to restore reliability to medical justice. While many thousands of patients suffer preventable medical injuries each year, only a small fraction of them are compensated for their losses. Administrative costs in today’s system are extremely high, and patients in similar circumstances often receive vastly different judicial outcomes. Health care experts often cite the current legal system as a major impediment to improving quality of care, since it effectively discourages physicians and hospitals from being candid about errors in treatment.
The prototype for health courts that Common Good and the Harvard researchers have developed would address key failings in the medical liability system by expediting compensation to injured patients, enhancing consistency in justice, facilitating patient safety initiatives, and improving efficiencies. The health court proposal has attracted interest from policymakers at both the federal and state levels. Legislation was introduced in the last Congress to facilitate the creation of health court pilot projects, with hearings held in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives. Legislative proposals were also advanced in a number of states. Much work remains to be done, however, to convert this interest into meaningful progress, particularly at the state level.
The RWJF grant will now make it possible for Common Good -- in collaboration with faculty from the Harvard School of Public Health, Harvard Medical School, University of Denver's Sturm College of Law, and Yale Law School -- to perform the additional outreach and consensus-building needed for state demonstration projects.
Working with its academic research partners, Common Good will launch a new State Action Project. The effort will help solidify interest in pursuing state pilot projects by providing information and technical assistance to interested parties in individual states. Common Good will identify states that offer particular promise for reform, and task forces in each state will create a health court proposal. Common Good will also continue its ongoing national outreach and coalition-building activities.
"Health courts are the best option for fixing our broken system of medical justice," said Philip K. Howard, chair of Common Good. "With the generous support and commitment of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, we will now be able to lay a foundation state-by-state for restoring reliability to medical justice."
"There is tremendous interest in health courts at the state level," said Paul Barringer, Common Good's general counsel. "The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation grant will now allow us to transform that interest into customized proposals for individual states."
"We have built a substantial base of research supporting the feasibility and potential benefits of the health courts proposal," said Michelle Mello, JD, PhD, MPhil, C. Boyden Gray Associate Professor of Health Policy and Law at the Harvard School of Public Health. "It's time to test these ideas with real-world policy experiments."
"The health court prototype developed by Common Good and the Harvard School of Public Health has changed the debate over malpractice reform and shows great promise for improving patient care and safety," said Nancy Barrand, RWJF senior program officer. "Demonstrating the concept in multiple states is likely to have equal, if not greater impact, on the field."
###
The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation focuses on the pressing health and health care issues facing our country. As the nation's largest philanthropy devoted exclusively to improving the health and health care of all Americans, the Foundation works with a diverse group of organizations and individuals to identify solutions and achieve comprehensive, meaningful and timely change. For more than 30 years the Foundation has brought experience, commitment, and a rigorous, balanced approach to the problems that affect the health and health care of those it serves. When it comes to helping Americans lead healthier lives and get the care they need, the Foundation expects to make a difference in your lifetime. For more information, visit www.rwjf.org.
Common Good (www.cgood.org) is a nonpartisan legal reform coalition dedicated to restoring common sense to America. Its advisory board is composed of leaders in a wide range of fields: former government officials, including Howard Baker, Bill Bradley, Griffin Bell, Newt Gingrich, Eric Holder, George McGovern, Diane Ravitch, Alan Simpson, and Richard Thornburgh; current and former university presidents, including Bill Brody, Tom Kean, George Rupp, and John Silber; and numerous other leaders in education, health care, law, business, and public policy. The Chair of Common Good is Philip K. Howard, a lawyer and author of The Death of Common Sense and The Collapse of the Common Good.
CONTACTS:
Common Good
Danielle Rhoades, (212) 576-2700
danielle@goodmanmedia.com.
Adam Coyne, (609) 627-5937
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
media@rwjf.org
| |
