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As part of his efforts to educate the public about heart health, Frederick Meadors, MD, a cardiothoracic surgeon at St. Vincent Infirmary Medical Center in Little Rock, AR, had planned to perform heart surgery on a patient while 330 people watched the procedure live through a video feed in a hospital auditorium.
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A health provider in Los Angeles that frequently treats celebrities announced recently that it had failed to protect the privacy of singer Britney Spears, and it wasn't the first time.
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Once a privacy breach occurs with a patient's medical records, the risk manager must act quickly and decisively, says Layna Cook, JD, an attorney specializing in health care risk management with the law firm McGlinchey Stafford in Baton Rouge, LA. The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) requires mitigation when a violation occurs, Cook notes.
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An elderly woman was admitted to the hospital complaining of constipation and suffering from septic shock. She subsequently suffered an interruption in her gastrointestinal (GI) motor activity, after which she was medicated and transferred to a second hospital for further treatment.
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An infant abduction was quickly solved in part because the hospital used an infant alarm that quickly alerted staff to the kidnapping, according to hospital and police officials in Sanford, FL.
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If you allow a live surgery broadcast, you should include some requirements for the company doing the broadcast, says Stacy Gulick, JD, an attorney with the law firm of Garfunkel in Great Neck, NY, and a former hospital risk manager.
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One of the most common threats to patient safety in obstetrics is the inability, or hesitation, of staff to clearly state their concern about a patient's status, says Edmund F. Funai, MD, associate professor in the Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology, and Reproductive Sciences at Yale School of Medicine in New Haven, CT. Too often, one clinician is concerned about a patient but does not effectively communicate that concern to others.
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Every risk manager worries about the obstetrics unit, where the number of adverse events may be small but the scope of the tragedy and liability can be huge.
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Risk managers and patient safety experts often run into resistance from physicians when they advocate electronic prescription systems, known as e-prescribing, even though the patient safety benefits are clear. But now a new survey suggests that physicians may be coming around.
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Risk managers who fret so much about compliance with the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) should worry at least that much about the potential liability from state laws addressing data breaches, say experts on personal data security.
