Playing With Bees
Official Website of Author
Frederick Southwick, M.D.
BOOK
PLAYING WITH BEES
$15.99
As a child Dr. Frederick Southwick loved to play with bees. He was fascinated by their industriousness as they buzzed from flower to flower, and to observe them up close he tried to grab them suffering multiple stings. Little did he realize that the very characteristics that encouraged him to observe bees would help him as a director of patient care quality and safety. Playing with Bees describes the challenges he faced trying to convert an academic health center from costly and dangerous to one that emulated the honeybee hive. He describes the critical illness of his 33 year-old wife caused by misdiagnosis and delays in care and the loss of his leg from an Achilles tendon repair that went wrong. He provides both a patient and physician font-line perspective on the many flaws in the U.S. healthcare system and creates a blue print for change. Playing with Bees is a must read for all those receiving and providing care in the modern healthcare system. Are you fed up with the status quo? After reading this book you can make a difference.
TRAILER
WHAT OTHERS ARE SAYING
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"Reading about Fred's real-life examples and lived experiences will help both patients and those dedicated to improving patient care quality and safety navigate the at times treacherous terrain of the US healthcare system. He ends with a vision of the ideal health system that we should all aspire to achieve, and he creatively illuminates the 100-million-year-old honeybee system as the framework for the transformation of our healthcare system.”
–Donald M., Berwick, MD MPP, President Emeritus and Senior Fellow, Institute for Healthcare Improvement, and former Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
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"In this candidly personal, scientifically informed, and often deeply moving book, Dr. Fred Southwick sheds light on numerous problems plaguing health care in hospitals and prescribes a powerful solution: systems-sensitive leadership. Using the fascinating metaphor of bees and their cooperative hives, he shows that the difference in the quality of outcomes – sometimes life or death – lies in how well leaders empower others to a complex system to carry out their work in harmony. This is a powerful message that should resonate beyond health care to leaders in all sectors.”
–Rosabeth Moss Kanter, Ph.D., Harvard Business School professor and author, most recently, of Think Outside the Building: How Advanced Leaders Can Change the World One Smart Innovation at a Time
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“Fred Southwick describes how he went from laboratory physician to expert in health care safety. It all began when his wife almost died from a medical error. Later, Fred himself lost a limb after surgery. He then used his scientific skill to understand how medical errors happen and how they can be prevented. He discovered that health care safety requires a team where errors are few; actions are well designed and executed; and everyone is committed to excellence.” As Fred points out, this excellence is what bees have been doing for millions of years. And even humans can do it.As an example, aviation’s safety record has been excellent over decades. Medicine needs to do the same. If you want to get started, read this book.”
–Mark A. Kelley MD -
Pulmonary-critical care physician and educator at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School. Previously Professor and Vice Dean at Penn Health System in Philadelphia and an Executive and Vice President at Henry Ford Health System in Detroit
BIO
Dr. Frederick Southwick is a graduate of Yale College earning varsity letters in football, wrestling and lacrosse. He received his MD from Columbia College of Physicians and Surgeons and trained in internal medicine at Boston City Hospital and completed his residency and infectious disease training at the Massachusetts General Hospital. He is a tenured Professor of Medicine and served as the Chief of Infectious Diseases at a major University Medical Center for 19 years. He has been an active NIH funded biomedical investigator for 30 years, studying how bacteria interact with the human host, and has published over 100 peer-reviewed research papers.
He is presently the Director of Patient Care Quality and Safety for an academic Division of Hospitalist Medicine.He is the creator of three Coursera massive open online courses: Fixing Healthcare Delivery (30,000 students), Fixing Healthcare Delivery 2.0 – Advanced Lean (4,900 students) and COVID-19: A Clinical Update (over 20,000 students). He has been applying principles of Toyota Production System to improve patient care. Finally, he is an active member of the Right Care Alliance a nonprofit organization dedicated to reforming healthcare so that it is affordable, safe, and accessible to all.
CONTACT
For general inquiries please contact: fsouthwick@gmail.com
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