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Terry Davis, MD, interim medical director at Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus, OH, says the hospital had to clarify some initial misunderstandings about when to call its rapid response team (RRT). At first, the clinicians were confused as to when the RRT should be called, as opposed to calling for a pediatric intensive care consult.
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The Ohio Children's Hospital Association (OCHA) and its six member hospitals studied where pediatric codes occur and found that many occur outside the neonatal and intensive care units. To improve safety, the group focused on reducing preventable codes occurring outside those areas.
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A protocol built around the use of rapid response teams (RRTs) has reduced incidences of preventable codes among pediatric patients by 20% at a group of hospitals in Ohio, one of the best demonstrations yet of the success of that approach in improving patient safety. One hospital even saw a drop of 40%.
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In response to several high-profile incidents of homeless patients being discharged in a less-than-dignified manner, the city of Los Angeles has enacted a new law that requires obtaining written consent to transport a patient anywhere other than his or her legal residence. Violating the law could result in a misdemeanor conviction.
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The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has proposed a new rule that would, if approved, update its payment policies and rates for hospital outpatient departments, including imaging, in the calendar year 2009.
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The most exciting aspect to the discovery of a new probe at The University of California at Los Angeles' (UCLA's) Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center might not be the potential of the probe itself for monitoring immune system function and treatment response, but rather the model scientists have put in place that could lead them to the discovery of many more valuable probes.
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While radiotherapy is commonly prescribed following surgery for patients with node-positive head and neck cancers, until now there has been little evidence that it actually improves survival.
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The idea of using milk as a contrast agent for gastrointestinal imaging has obvious appeal.
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There is no question that the use of MRI prior to breast cancer surgery has increased dramatically in recent years. At the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN, for example, the use of preoperative MRI in breast cancer patients more than doubled between 2003 and 2006.
