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Collection of high-dollar accounts is important to patient access for more reasons than the obvious. In addition to having a direct impact on the hospital's bottom line, it boosts staff morale and gives everyone a reason to celebrate. It's a golden opportunity to broadcast success to other areas of the hospital.
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Did you just overhear a patient's wife say that one of your access employees is always friendly? This simple statement gives you a big opportunity.
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Obtaining "non-traditional" contact information, such as cell phone numbers and e-mail addresses, has become a major priority for University of Pittsburg Medical Center (UPMC)'s patient access department. Both of these are now required fields in the system.
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Instead of "sticker shock," which refers to being surprised at the high price tag on an item, many patients these days are experiencing "benefits shock" when they learn how little their insurance actually covers.
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Here's yet another reason to improve patient handling: Health care workers involved in patient handling tasks may be at greater risk of assaults from patients.
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The release of millions of N95 filtering facepiece respirators during the novel H1N1 pandemic has revealed a potentially serious problem in preparedness: N95 respirators have different fit characteristics, and not all of them can be successfully fit-tested on health care's predominantly female work force.
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Given that some trace the very founding of hospital infection prevention programs back to the first volleys in the longstanding battle with multidrug-resistant organisms (MDROs), it comes as little surprise that The Joint Commission has made these bugs the focus of a National Patient Goal for 2010.
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The Joint Commission has dropped a controversial infection prevention patient safety goal that recommended sentinel event investigations of unanticipated patient deaths and serious injuries due to health care-associated infections (HAIs).
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These following tips were adapted from "Suggestions for preventing musculoskeletal disorders in home health care workers," published in Home Healthcare Nurse.
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Call it the perfect storm: Patients with dementia or serious chronic illness being treated in the home. Rising levels of obesity. Aging health care workers. A lack of safety equipment.