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In The Joint Commission's revised standards, rationales and elements of performance for 2009, which will take effect on Jan. 1, 2009, the emergency management standards have, for the first time, been placed in their own chapter.
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When The Joint Commission announced its National Patient Safety Goals for 2009, it became clear that the recent interest in hospital-acquired infections (HAIs) has only intensified.
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After years of lobbying by emergency medicine groups and a summit last fall to take a closer look at the issue, a significant change has been made in the National Patient Safety Goal concerning medication reconciliation for 2009. ED managers welcome the change.
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Just because surveys by The Joint Commission are no longer announced, it doesn't mean you can't prepare for them, say ED experts.
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In a move that emergency medicine experts hope will provide at least partial relief to the call coverage challenge, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has proposed a new regulation that would allow hospitals to establish community call arrangements at a regional level to satisfy their Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA) on-call physician requirements.
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At first glance, it sounds like only good news for ED managers who are frustrated at their inability to have specialty services adequately covered.
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ED managers should be pleased with the proposed increases in ambulatory payment classifications (APCs) for fiscal year 2009, says Dennis Beck, MD, FACEP, CEO of Beacon Medical Services in Denver and chair of the quality and performance committee of the American College of Emergency Physicians (ACEP).
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In the wake of a flash flood in June that forced the closing of Columbus (IN) Regional Hospital, the ED reopened about two weeks later in a mobile unit called the Carolinas Mobile Emergency Department-1 (MED-1).
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With The Joint Commission's 2009 National Patient Safety Goals focusing on hospital-acquired infections (HAIs), ED managers say the key to compliance remains one of the most basic but difficult to implement strategies of all: hand washing.
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Involving the patient in their own care, an important component of the National Patient Safety Goals for several years, including 2009, also can be a big help for EDs looking to control hospital-acquired infections (HAIs), says Christopher Beach, MD, vice chair, Department of Emergency Medicine, at the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Evanston, IL. So can education, he adds.
