3 Stories You Need: Improving Healthcare as a Community, How Design Thinking Impacts Patient Experience

We know you’re busy, but we don’t want you to miss important healthcare quality and patient safety news. Here’s a roundup of stories you may have missed but need to take a look at before calling it a week. (Subscribe today if you’d like these news alerts delivered to you.)

1. We need a whole-community response in health and health care
   All too often, healthcare leaders discount patients or “ordinary people” as a resource when making decisions and working toward solutions. This blogger contemplates how we might all benefit from a “whole community” response similar to the one witnessed during the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey. Blog: Susannah Fox 
2. Parent-Provider Miscommunications in Hospitalized Children
   Research published in Hospital Pediatrics, showed that parents reported patient-provider miscommunications more often than attending physicians did, and when parents did report miscommunications, it impacted satisfaction ratings. Hospital Pediatrics   
3. Health Care Providers Can Use Design Thinking to Improve Patient Experiences
   While design thinking is typically associated with the development of new products and improved spaces,   healthcare leaders are taking the concept a step further and tackling barriers like patient transportation, clinician-patient communication, and patient bias in pursuit of better outcomes, positive patient experiences and reduced costs. Harvard Business Review