| September 30, 1999 | 03 00050 61 99093003 |
Ms. Jeanne Bradley
Coordinator
Jeanne.Bradley@ncal.kaiperm.org
Administration Department
Kaiser Permanente
Permanente Medical Group, Inc.
Park Shadelands
320 Lennon Lane
Walnut Creek, CA 94598
| Subject: | Thank You |
Dear Jeanne,
Just saying thanks again for your help these past weeks. Mark Mangrai seems to be providing effective Patient Assistance, so your suggestion to contact him was a good one. You may know he was out for awhile with a personal injury, and initially felt his work was at issue. I think he now realizes the focus is larger, and so has taken up several small projects to follow up. We will see how well it turns out. The thing we are addressing doesn't have many Home Runs. It is mostly singles and good defense that takes persistance, which requires faith in ideas.
Two ideas that have evolved from working with Kaiser are set out in a letter to a reporter on a series of articles about the high cost of medical mistakes. My letter explains that other industries make more mistakes than in medical practice, and goes on to explain the cause and solution, some of which we are trying to apply at Kaiser.
Possibly you could comment, and/or perhaps know of kindred spirits at Kaiser, who could take a serious look, at the the idea of a Patient Advocate, which would boost the role of Kaiser's existing Patient Assistance role.
The second idea is common education for doctors and patients to support a stronger partnership under guidelines in Kaiser's Healthwise Handbook.
Thanks again for your help.
Sincerely,
THE WELCH COMPANY
Rod Welch
rowelch@ibm.net