Customer Reviews

Why Hospitals Should Fly: The Ultimate Flight Plan to Patient Safety and Quality Care

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I just finished this book today and highly recommend it to anyone interested in knowing more about medicine, hospitals, and patient care. Doctors have been under fire from many different groups to perform the impossible -- save everyone and do it cheaply. Doctors, HMO's, lawyers, patients, and government each have a hand in the state of our health care system. This book outlines a sound approach to helping medicine achieve a better safety record and ultimately, better patient outcomes. This is a must read for any medical professional or interested party and I would love to see St. Michaels in my neighborhood. Well done -- and long overdue. Aviation safety has many things to teach us -- can we implement these ideas? Or maybe the question is, "Can we afford not to?"

I wanted to take a moment to reflect that this book "Why hospitals should fly", along with another "Ending Nurse-to-Nurse Hostility: Why Nurses Eat Their Young and Each Other" are perhaps the key tools aside from the human factor approach, that have stirred enthusiasm and created impetus for our organization to change its ways. We as a hospital have suffered from errors in the past, and what hospital hasn't. However with a wonderful week of seminars and guidance from the authors, we are reaching out to our employees to empower them to foster the changes necessary to bring an end to errors due to communication, increase teamwork, espirit de corps and generally allow the organization to learn. Thanks to John and Kathleen..........Brilliant.....

I have just recently left my long term practice in pulmonary and critical care medicine to start up and head an intensivist program (full time critical care physicians available in an ICU) in a hospital in California. I know medicine primarily from the inpatient and hospital view since that was the basis of my practice, and I have been until now a hospital medical director, and a critical care director. In the last few years I have taken an MBA in Healthcare and I am grounded in business operational views.

I preparing for this program I have read widely in the quality literature. I came across this book on Amazon. The title was intriguing as I had always admired the precision and professionalism of flight crews and wondered why Hospital medicine couldn't be similar. The aviation approach to quality is often mentioned in the literature, and physicians are frequently demoralized in lectures which point out the difference between our 2 sigma track record and aviation's 6 sigma. The best run show in the hospital has been with Anesthesia who picked up the ball over 10 years ago and have shown a dramatic improvement in quality.

I found the beginning of the book to be a little odd with the type of story-telling the author uses to get his information across. By chapter 3, however, I was well into it and found that the book reads easily. The author is able to add emotional content to his story, both to underscore his points and, I believe, to aid in recollection. His medical and aviation stories are excellent and carry the book forward. I even enjoyed his Star Trek allusions.

I was particularly impressed with his description of the workings of the idealized ICU and the OR. His understanding of physician behavior and motivations is outstanding. He also understands nurses and CEO's.

His ICU picture is similar to my vision of a great ICU, but his is more clearly thought out. I feel that his discussion has helped my clarify my thinking regarding staff interaction. I particularly appreciated his description of the little red towel worn by nurses when they are handling medications, a sign to let others know that they should not be distracted during their performance of what needs to be understood as a dangerous duty which needs their full attention. Discussions of the Swiss cheese method of quality and issues of normalized deviance are also excellent.

I found his discussion of revamping nursing functions on the floors a bit utopian, but that I admit is beyond my competency.

I very highly recommend this book for all professionals and administrators involved in hospital care. My copy will be on the ICU nurse administrator's desk in the morning.

A gripping read, where I learned a great deal about aviation safety which applies well to medicine because of the human factor. As a nurse, patient safety is incredibly important to me, but I understand my human fallibility and the fact that any one of us in medicine can make a mistake. John clearly describes how to minimize the possibility of error, but as in the aviation industry, it will take many years to change the culture of doctors in particular. The CEO of my hospital has my copy of the book!

The best book I hve ever read, fiction or nonfiction. It makes you want to ask your hospital CEO, "have you read this book" and why aren't we doing it yet.

This book was required reading for a nursing course I am taking, and was pleasantly surprised how interesting it was! It's plot is a doctor to doctor discussion of the inadequacies of our safety systems in hospitals and the example of a hospital in Colorado which is innovated a complete and outstanding system based on the aviation industry. It is pro-nurse participation and also, quite easy to read. Thoroughly enjoyed it and want to pass it on to past managers and CNO's I have worked with.

This book not only gives you a picture about what a hospital could be, but a blueprint on how to accomplish this. The author is also very good at identifying a role for all disciplines (from nursing through administration). It won't happen quickly, but importantly, it CAN happen.

I just finished this book...I could not put it down. I have been a nurse for 36 years....why didn't we have this in school, and why aren't med students required to read it? Nance uncovers the fundamental problem with medical errors...we all need to work together and respect what each one of us does. We all have valuable insight as well as a unique perspective into the care of the patient, whether we are a nurse, doctor, respiratory therapist or unit secretary.
I teach continuing education for those who provide healthcare in Maternal-Child Health. My target audience is nurses, midwives, doctors (if they choose to attend!) Risk Managers (or, as Nance calls them, Chief Safety Officers!...just about anyone who is in involved in patient care. I will recommend this book in my classes from now on. I have the Kindle edition, and I just purchased the hardcover so I can show it to the attendees of my class.
I ride public transportation in the 3rd largest city in America. It's motto for safety is "If you see something, say something". Maybe we should adopt that same edict in hospitals.

Excellent way to present well documented information on some problems that plague health care today. Also is a great way to suggest changes rather than just presenting and excoriating the problems as is too often the tendencies these days. Mr Nance also recognizes that solutions to problems will be local and that a "cookie cutter" approach will not produce the desired results in each situation. I would strongly recommend this book!

The best book about why hospitals should fly!

Very Utopian, but it shows a vision of an alternative to current chaotic and dangerous healthcare systems failing mainly due to poor communication between staff and systems which neither serve the patients or the staff.

Highlights the danger of doctors who are taught that they are to be infallible and cannot be contradicted by anyone, ever. Very good book, but definately not enough examples from the aviation industry!! More example from nuclear power wouldn't go amiss either.