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The American College of Emergency Physicians (ACEP) is warning that the nations pandemic influenza plan does not address the lack of surge capacity and isolation capability in the nations hospital emergency departments.
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How would you like to reduce ventilator-associated pneumonia at your organizations intensive care unit (ICU) by 19%, and decrease bloodstream infections by 36%, in only eight months? Those are the impressive results achieved by hospitals participating in the Maryland Patient Safety Centers ICU Safety Culture Collaborative.
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According to a new study, a growing number of consumers are using online hospital performance web sites to make health care decisions. In addition, providers are using publicly reported measures to make quality improvement decisions.
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Your organization probably has a very small number of serious adverse outcomes, but in all likelihood, near-misses are very common, says Richard J. Croteau, MD, JCAHOs executive director of patient safety initiatives. We encourage organizations to include a broad range of events in their reporting systems broader than what we require, he says.
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A program designed to prevent emergency department (ED) visits and readmissions for chronically ill older adults sends nurse case managers from Valley Health in Winchester, VA, into Virginias northern Shenandoah Valley to assist clients with special health needs.
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Are you collecting data on surgical infection prevention (SIP)? If so, there is a new resource to find out how your organization compares with others.
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The use of opioids for pain relief is limited by what some have called opiophobia, or the fear that patients will become addicted to the drugs. The Veterans Health Administration (VHA) has spelled out a means of addressing the drawbacks to opioid therapy and reducing the fear of prescribing opioids.
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The National Institutes of Health (NIH) found its sweeping new ethics changes were proving a hard pill for its employees to swallow. As a result, they supplemented it with proposals that respond to actual and threatened resignations by some of the key NIH employees who say the new regulation, which requires employees to divest themselves of outside consulting and investments with pharmaceutical and biotech industries, is too restrictive.
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Illinois has become the first state to enact legislation based on the idea that an apology might serve as the most effective means to stop some medical malpractice lawsuits.
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A convicted murderer who sought a reprieve so he could donate his liver to his ill sister was executed in May after Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniel was advised by doctors that Gregory Scott Johnson was not a good candidate to be a donor, and that his sister, Debra Otis, would likely receive a donor organ through regular channels within a matter of months. Johnsons bid to become an organ donor resurrected debate about the ethics of accepting organs from condemned inmates.
