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The Association for the Advancement of Medical Instrumentation (AAMI) and American National Standards Institute (ANSI) are combining the recommended practice on flash sterilization with other standards into a single document on steam sterilization.
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Outpatient surgery managers, take note: A Florida ambulatory surgery center (ASC) was banned from admitting new patients for 18 days following a determination by the state that the administrator/risk manager failed to prevent a male staff member from sexually abusing a patient after complaints from other staff members.
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In an ambulatory surgery center that was busy recently handling several patients, two patients received two doses of fentanyl instead of one dose each of fentanyl and midazolam, according to the Institute for Safe Medication Practices (ISMP) in Huntingdon Valley, PA.
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Question: Our surgery center was bought by a chain surgery center at the end of last year. We received a bonus every quarter for the past 12 years by the surgeons who owned it before they sold it. Ever since XXX Company bought us, we have not received any type of bonus. They tell us we probably will not receive a bonus that it is not in their budget!
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While a key component of preventing surgical site infections is to educate staff members and physicians, don't forget that your patients and their family members need to understand the basics of infection control and infection identification.
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Question: Many of our surgeons pledged a certain number of cases they would do when we built our ambulatory surgery center last year.
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Candy stripers and pink ladies have been delivering flowers and mail to hospital patients for as long as anyone can remember, but today's volunteers are moving into other areas of the hospital where they can help outpatient surgery staff with many tasks.
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Ambulatory programs' compliance rate for 13 of the 16 applicable National Safety Patient Goals exceeded 93% in 2005. However, the remaining three goals met compliance requirements less than 89% of the time.
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Medication reconciliation, labeling medications, staff competency, and Life Safety Code requirements were all topics upon which surveyors focused for organizations surveyed by the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Health-care Organizations in the past six months.
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The Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations will publish a separate standards manual for ambulatory surgery centers that will become effective in January 2007.
