Giving Compass' Take:

• Michael L. Millenson at The Conversation discusses how the U.S. is nowhere near the goal, set 20 years ago, of cutting medical errors in half, however, there are pockets of progress.

• How can policymakers address this problem? What are doctors and healthcare workers doing? 

• What issue areas are health funders supporting and what's next? Click here to find out. 

In late November 1999, a TV producer called me about an alarming report that 44,000 to 98,000 Americans were being killed each year by preventable errors in hospitals and another 1 million were being injured.

Could that be true? Based on my research, I replied, the estimate seemed low.

The To Err is Human report from the Institute of Medicine has been called a “seminal moment” in the patient safety fight. The public furor sparked by the group’s assertion that medical mistakes were deadlier than breast cancer, auto accidents or AIDS prompted new laws, as well as vows to meet the Institute of Medicine’s goal of cutting medical errors in half in five years.

Twenty years after the report’s release, how safe is our medical care?

Read the full article about how to stop medical errors by Michael L. Millenson at The Conversation.