Patient safety incidents cost the federal Medicare program $8.8 billion and resulted in 238,337 potentially preventable deaths during 2004 through 2006, according to HealthGrades' fifth annual Patient Safety in American Hospitals Study.

More than 215,000 people will die of sepsis in the United States each year, more than 750,000 will require hospital treatment, and the costs will be nearly $17 billion. Severe sepsis is one of the top 10 leading causes of death in adults, yet there has been little progress in recent decades in treating sepsis and septic shock, and the mortality rate remains disturbingly high.