The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right

Atul Gawande

Picador USA

2011

215 páginas

7h 10m

ISBN-13: 9780312430009

A New York Times Bestseller In latest bestseller, Atul Gawande shows what the simple idea of the checklist reveals about the complexity of our lives and how we can deal with it. The modern world has given us stupendous know-how. Yet avoidable failures continue to plague us in health care, government, the law, the financial industry--in almost every realm of organized activity. And the reason is simple: the volume and complexity of knowledge today has exceeded our ability as individuals to properly deliver it to people--consistently, correctly, safely. We train longer, specialize more, use ever-advancing technologies, and still we fail. Atul Gawande makes a compelling argument that we can do better, using the simplest of methods: the checklist. In riveting stories, he reveals what checklists can do, what they can't, and how they could bring about striking improvements in a variety of fields, from medicine and disaster recovery to professions and businesses of all kinds. And the insights are making a difference. Already, a simple surgical checklist from the World Health Organization designed by following the ideas described here has been adopted in more than twenty countries as a standard for care and has been heralded as "the biggest clinical invention in thirty years" (The Independent).

Resenhas (1)

3 (Bom)

Improving the medical community

This book is about the importance of having checklists, especially in processes where the stakes are high. Checklists became norm in aviation where it is used to avoid reflexive routines due to the repetitive nature of the job. Gawande is an enthusiast of putting the checklist as a medical routine. After all, most of medical errors can be traced to these “automatisms”. What I liked about the book are the tips to build a good checklist.

Before reading the book, I asked myself why something so common, established like a checklist deserve an entire book to be celebrated. After the read I realized that the book is also a condemnation of the tightness and hierarchical nature of the medical community. There is still a culture of fear instilled by “top of the pyramid” doctors among young physicians and nurses who are afraid of questioning decisions or warn about something that needed to be checked. It is still a sad reality in many hospitals and there is still work to do to improve the environment.