-
The Joint Commission has put a one-year moratorium on its National Patient Safety Goals (NPSGs), as it reviews current goals with input from the field. One goal in particular, Goal 8 regarding medication reconciliation, will no longer be scored as part of the accreditation decision until a more refined goal is set forth in 2010.
-
Transitions of care have been a bugaboo of medicine for years. And the problem isn’t getting easier. With accountable care organizations and the increased emphasis on various spokes of the healthcare wheel being able to talk clearly across the radius to each other, it has become more and more important to find simple, proven ways to ensure that handing a patient from one part of the system to the other happens quickly, yet with all the pertinent information.
-
Bedside registration in the emergency department (ED) and a new transfer center are the latest innovations helping to define the department of patient access and business operations at Philadelphias Presbyterian Medical Center.
-
How does a hospital get a No. 1 ranking and score in the 99th percentile on the South Bend, IN-based Press Ganey Associates patient satisfaction survey? It might have something to do with taking a good situation and continually trying to improve it.
-
Outcome measurement at University of Washington Medical Center in Seattle typically is tied in some way with quality improvement office initiatives. Therefore, to improve patient education, staff recently looked at the quarterly patient satisfaction reports the medical center receives from a vendor.
-
To enable senior leaders to gain knowledge about quality and safety performance within the organization the quality department should create a concise, yet complete, measurement report.
-
Once a patient makes the decision to seek emergency care, their "internal clock" starts, asserts Alex Rosenau, DO, FACEP vice chair, department of emergency medicine, at Lehigh Valley Hospital and Health Network, Allentown, PA.
-
In findings that at first glance may seem puzzling, the 2007 ED Pulse Report patient satisfaction survey by Press Ganey Associates indicated that while ED wait times continue to increase, so does patient satisfaction.
-
Some aspects of core measure compliance call for a "handshake" between quality professionals and physicians, says Christopher Sharp, MD, clinical assistant professor at Stanford (CA) University Medical Center. Here are the best ways to collaborate:
-
Electronic health records (EHRs) made little or no difference on 14 of 17 quality measures examined, and quality was worse for one measure, a recent study found.