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The patchwork of call panel arrangements is unwieldy, expensive, and may compromise the quality of care for patients in the emergency department. This dramatic finding is part of a new report that outlines the seriousness of the call panel situation in California, often considered to be a state that precedes the rest of the country, and offers recommendations to remedy the situation.
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Caught between the proverbial rock and a hard place, the University of Mississippi Medical Center (UMC) in Jackson has taken drastic action and announced that on a case-by-case basis, it may decide not to accept future transfers from facilities it believes have the resources to care for those patients themselves. But in so doing, UMC may have put itself in danger of violating the Emergency Medical Treatment & Labor Act (EMTALA), says one expert.
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Just how serious is the on-call panel coverage situation in California? Serious enough that this fall, the states emergency physicians put up nearly $2 million of their own money in support of a ballot initiative that would have added $600 million a year to pay for uncompensated emergency care. The initiative did not pass.
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No one is claiming its a cure-all for ED overcrowding, but a number of facilities have turned to postponing elective surgeries that required admissions as an important part of a multifaceted plan to ease the burden on their harried ED staff. And when they do, many give the ED manager a key role in the decision-making process.
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An administrative huddle at Latter Day Saints (LDS) Hospital in Salt Lake City has been tremendously helpful in determining when to postpone elective surgeries, but it has had a much broader impact on patient flow in the ED and the hospital as a whole.
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ED managers may not possess a crystal ball, but the ability to predict future events is nonetheless critical to their success, notes Bonnie Coalt, RN, MS, director of nursing at Miami Valley Hospital in Dayton, OH.
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A new study published in the journal Academic Emergency Medicine contains good news and bad news for ED managers. The good news: In a survey of 767 patients from 12 EDs, most individuals surveyed (88%) believed their safety from medical errors had been good, very good, or excellent.
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The Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations has issued its final modifications to the National Patient Safety Goal 2b, which address its 2005 requirements for standardizing medical abbreviations and symbols.
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