Recognizing Excellence in Diagnosis is a national initiative to publicly report and recognize hospitals for preventing patient harm due to diagnostic errors. The multiyear project is funded with a grant of $1.2 million by the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation.
The goals of the initiative are to:
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Build national consensus recommending practices hospitals can adopt to improve diagnostic quality and safety
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Collect data from a pilot group of 100 hospitals
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Publicly report data, engage consumers, and foster accountability
NEW UPDATED REPORT: Recognizing Excellence in Diagnosis: Recommended Practices for Hospitals
The Leapfrog Group released the updated report Recognizing Excellence in Diagnosis: Recommended Practices for Hospitals. This landmark report is the result of an intensive year-long effort bringing together the nation’s leading experts on diagnostic excellence, including physicians, nurses, patients, health plans, and employers. Together, the multi-stakeholder group reviewed the 29 recommenced practices for hospitals identified in the original report in 2022 and distilled the list to 22 recommended practices in 2024. This report updates the original 2022 report on recommended practices with a fresh literature review to take advantage of the formidable advances in the science of quality measurement in diagnosis, as well as our expert field-testing of practices with through a formal pilot process, and our analysis of comments and feedback from hundreds of hospitals across the country. Read the report.
Pilot Survey Findings Published in The Journal of Hospital Medicine
In August 2024, the results of Leapfrog’s Diagnostic Excellence Pilot Survey were published.
Key Findings:
Ninety-five hospitals from 23 states responded to the surveys. On average, hospitals adopted 9 of 16 practices (56%) in Domain 1 and 8 of 13 practices (62%) in Domain 2. Implementation varied widely, with some hospitals using as few as three practices. Commonly adopted practices included providing medical interpreters, ensuring access to radiologists, enabling error reporting, and notifying patients of diagnostic errors. Less commonly implemented practices were forming multidisciplinary teams for diagnostic safety, CEO commitment to diagnostic excellence, conducting risk assessments, and training clinicians in clinical reasoning.
Read the journal article here.
Why We Need to Address Diagnostic Errors
- A 2015 National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine landmark report Improving Diagnosis in Health Care highlighted the magnitude of the harm associated with diagnostic errors, possibly accounting for some 40,000 – 80,000 deaths annually, within the top ten causes of death nationally.
- The report concluded that “most people will experience at least one diagnostic error in their lifetime, sometimes with devastating consequences.”
- An estimated 12 million Americans will experience a diagnostic error in primary care each year, and another 250,000 will be harmed by a diagnostic error as an inpatient.
- An analysis found that diagnostic errors are among the leading causes of malpractice claims in almost every large database, and amongst all claims, are responsible for the most harm and the highest costs.