Publisher's Synopsis
In the past two centuries, medicine has undergone a revolution. Not only do we have effective treatments; we also have at least some hard evidence that they actually work. But how well do those who treat us actually treat us? Remarkably, this is a question that until recently had not even begun to be asked. Now, however, medicine is finally embracing the ideas of risk assessment, quality monitoring and safety protocols - albeit decades after the civil-aviation and automobile industries. In this book, Samer Nashef, a world-leading heart surgeon, explores this second revolution in medicine. As creator of the world's most successful risk model in medicine, he looks at the development of tools to measure how well surgeons and hospitals are performing and shows how these techniques have become an essential part of healthcare.