We have been tasked with creating quality improvement projects to implement upon our return back to the real world in our home hospitals and clinics. Part of me is full of ideas: making OB M&M actually about analysis of cases from which we need to learn more, having all chiefs incorporate teaching about communication/transparency/harm into daily hospital life, getting a checklist for preventive medical care back into our EMR, encouraging shared decision making between providers and patients/families regarding end of life decisions, and more. I vacillate between being excited about so many great possibilities and the negative attitude that ‘it’s all just a drop in the bucket, so what does it matter?’ I know that many small things add up to great change (for more info, read about ‘The Prevention Paradox” by G. Rose), and I try to let my optimistic side win the battle in my head. For the moment, I am a novice. But watch out healthcare, because there are 29 powerful novices each working on our own small-ish projects, joining hundreds before us and hopefully hundreds after, and it’s going to snowball – the slopes of Telluride are steep.
