When is the dual role of physician/investigator a conflict of interest? This is the question IRBs might consider in the aftermath of clinical trial participant Dan Markingson's suicide.
For years, the debate has continued about returning the results of research to the study participants who made it possible. Would such a process be expensive and unwieldy? Could it cause more harm than good, when participants receive bad news?
The national focus on patient-centered care isn't just about teaching patients to become more engaged in self-management of their careit also means putting patients on committees and advisory boards to participate in the process of developing quality programs.
A growing number of organizations are disclosing errors to patients, but this can be disastrous if handled poorly.
Researchers at Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH) in Boston have shown that using bar-code technology to augment the counting of surgical sponges during an operative procedure increases the detection rate of miscounted and/or misplaced sponges. Their research is published in the April 2008 issue of the Annals of Surgery.
Health care-associated infections due to multiple drug-resistant organisms, central line-associated bloodstream infections, and surgical site infections. The Joint Commission's new National Patient Safety Goals (NPSGs) for 2009 require you to implement evidence-based practices to prevent all three of these.
In an effort to clarify the requirements of its Universal Protocol, The Joint Commission has made several revisions and additions, effective Jan. 1, 2009.
If a patient noticed a health care provider didn't wash his hands, or suspected she was being given an incorrect dosage of medication, would she hesitate to speak up about her concern?
Medication errors harm roughly one out of 15 hospitalized children, according to a new study. Researchers reported an 11.1% rate of adverse drug events in pediatric patients. Of those, 22% were deemed preventable, 17.8% could have been identified earlier, and 16.8% could have been mitigated more effectively.
