Many of those who work in hospitals know there is always potential for staff to make mistakes, and that those mistakes might cause patient harm. Hospitals are constantly working toward better patient care, putting systems in place to ensure that clinicians double- and triple-check their work,...
Editor’s note: The following column explores patient safety from the perspective of a newcomer to the patient safety field. Columnist Catherine Hinz, MHA, currently works at PatientSafe Solutions, Inc. Previously, she served as the patient lead at HealthEast Care System...
Preventing medical errors and patient harm is a top priority for most hospitals. Physicians, nurses, and other clinicians do not enter their professions to produce poor outcomes.
Most clinicians understand the dangers multidrug-resistant organisms (MDRO) present to patients. Most also understand that these germs are easily spread through hands and other surfaces, and that hand washing is a proven method for preventing MDROs from spreading. Yet—as many patient safety...
In patient safety and quality, there is no shortage of data and information that needs to be gathered from an inpatient stay. Data are collected for compliance with federal quality-of-care measures, federal and state patient safety indicator and event tracking, accreditation, professional...
Lean works for healthcare. It has simple concepts to learn and teach. However, Lean projects are far from easy to undertake. Accomplishing Lean requires hard work, and it is tiring. The “easy” part of Lean is the basic philosophy, which is clear and concise and something on which staff members...
Editor’s note: The following column answers some data-related questions on “Patient Safety Talk,” an HCPro listserv that addresses many of the topics covered in this newsletter and is available to subscribers on the Patient Safety Monitor website. This month’s questions are...
Except for some minor changes, The Joint Commission has announced that there will be no other updates to the 2011 National Patient Safety Goals (NPSG).
On July 7, staff members in the pediatric ICU (PICU) at Steven and Alexandra Cohen Children’s Medical Center of New York (CCMC) celebrated one full year free of central line infections.
