|
S.C. Mom Comments on Passage of Lewis Blackman Patient Safety Act
Editor’s Note: The following statement by Helen Blackman, the founder of the Mothers Against Medical Error, (MAME) was made on the occasion of the passage of legislation named for her son in Columbia, S.C., on June 14, 2005. She is now working for the implementation of this law. Lewis Blackman lost his life in a South Carolina hospital due to medical error.
This moment has been a long time coming. There were certainly times when I thought we would never get here. The one thing I resolved in the beginning was that we would go down fighting. It is thanks to many wonderful people that we didn't ever have to consider that eventuality. I just want to thank, very briefly, for their invaluable support in the Senate, our primary Senate sponsor J. Verne Smith, the Senate Medical Affairs Committee, and especially its chairman Harvey Peeler; in the House, Representative David Mack and the members of the 3M Committee; and in both chambers, our many co-sponsors from both sides of the aisle. Our most profound thanks go to our own Representative James Smith, the single most significant figure in the passage of this law. Representative Smith committed to this project within weeks of Lewis's death and has been tireless in seeing it to completion. Without his unerring political acumen and unswerving dedication to principle, there would be no Lewis Blackman Act. I also want to thank the South Carolina Hospital Association, who were willing to venture into uncharted territory for the sake of doing the right thing; the Medical University of South Carolina, who stepped out from behind the "white wall of silence" and helped us turn a tragedy to good; and the South Carolina AARP, who immediately saw the importance of this issue for the state's senior citizens. Above all, I thank the Mothers Against Medical Error and our many friends and supporters across the state, who have been amazing in their willingness to call and write legislators, offer endless advice, review dozens of drafts, and just generally see this through. The Lewis Blackman Act is a tribute to all of you. But I also want you all to remember that this victory was bought at great sacrifice. When we took Lewis to the hospital four and a half years ago, we had no clear idea how hospitals worked. We had no idea who was who, or how to call for help when the system broke down. That lack of information cost our child his life, and it cost the state of South Carolina a part of its future. The Lewis Blackman Act is intended to save other parents, other patients, from having to live that nightmare. It is intended to give back to South Carolina those shiny little fragments of its future it might otherwise not even know it had lost. One of the most rewarding aspects of working on Lewis's law has been the evolution of a remarkable coalition of people who would ordinarily think they had little in common. These people have reached across boundaries and set aside special interests, trying to do the right thing in the name of a young boy many of them never even met. Our challenge is going to be to keep this effort going—to see that the Lewis Blackman Act is implemented effectively and in a way that is true to its spirit. Our greater challenge will be to follow where the Lewis Blackman Act can lead us—to address the larger issues of patient safety and medical care that are now coming to the forefront across the country. Lewis was one of the top students in South Carolina. He was also an actor. One of his final roles was as the young prince Mamilius in Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale. Shakespeare's little princes are usually doomed, and Mamilius is no exception. It is Mamilius who gives the play its name, when he says, "A sad tale's best for winter..." Like Lewis, Mamilius is a jokester and a storyteller. Because of his early demise, Mamilius does not have a major part in The Winter's Tale, but he has a crucial one. It is the death of little Mamilius that ultimately brings the adults to their senses, forces them to reconcile and carry forward. That is the way I have thought of Lewis these past four years. So I will end by thanking the most important person of all: my young prince, the boy I once dreamed would grow up to change the world. Maybe, in some way, you will. Lewis, this one's for you.
Find out more about the Lewis Blackman story at http://www.carolcivicvoice.org/index_Page1411.htm, and at http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/iatrogenic/message/1892.
|
|
Carolina Civic Voice Summer 2005 Vol 5, No 3 |