Innovation and Healthcare Top ASQ’s Washington Agenda in June

WASHINGTON — In meetings with lawmakers June 7-8, 2006, ASQ offered to supply quality expertise in support of President Bush’s American Competitiveness Initiative and two bills now before Congress.

The meetings have focused on two hot topics in the Quality community: innovation and healthcare quality improvement.

ASQ Managing Director Laurel Nelson-Rowe and Amy Kimball of Sellery Associates, ASQ’s Washington representatives, discussed the Competitiveness Initiative with Daniel Byers, deputy chief of staff to Office of Science and Technology policy director John H. Marburger.

The initiative includes proposed increases in federal funding for research and development focused on U.S. programs in math and science education, including the development of new workforce training systems and standards for assessing program effectiveness and efficiency.

Byers said ASQ could pay an important role in creating new, more timely measurement and metric systems and statistical reports, which he said is a “personal interest” of OST head Marburger.

Jason Mulvihill, majority staff director of the Senate Technology, Innovation and Competitiveness Subcommittee — who has been instrumental in work to expand the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award into new categories — encouraged ASQ members to learn about and support the National Innovation Act, which was recently re-introduced in the House and the Senate as the American Innovation and Competitiveness Act. (PDF, 587 KB). Mulvihill said the bill has bipartisan support and that he’s “cautiously optimistic” it will pass during this legislative session.

Once the bill is signed into law, Mulvihill said, ASQ’s expertise could help shape the measurement systems meant to ensure “that taxpayer dollars are well-spent.”

The bill also provides for the current presidential Medal of Technology to be repositioned as the Medal of Technology and Innovation.

ASQ’s representatives also met on the Innovation Act with staff representing senators Ben Nelson (D-Nebraska), Lamar Alexander (R-Tennessee), Saxby Chambliss (R-Georgia), Johnny Isakson (R-Georgia) and Richard Lugar (R-Indiana).

On the healthcare front, Nelson-Rowe and Kimball met with staff for senators Hillary Clinton (D-New York) and Barack Obama (D-Illinois) to discuss the National Medical Error Disclosure and Compensation (MEDiC) Act, which was introduced by the senators in September 2005. The legislation aims to promote a culture of safety through:

• Improving the quality of healthcare by encouraging open communication between patients and providers about medical errors and patient safety events and conditions affecting patient safety.
• Reducing the rate of preventable errors.
• Ensuring that patients have access to fair compensation for medical injury due to error, negligence, or malpractice.
• Reducing the cost of medical liability insurance for healthcare providers.

If passed, the bill would establish an Office of Patient Safety and Health Care Quality reporting to the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services. This office would be responsible for establishing a national patient safety database, a national medical-error disclosure and compensation program and a national MEDiC grant program.