Patient Safety Monitor Journal, December 2017

Editor's Note: Click the PDF button above for a full edition of the December 2017 edition of Patient Safety Monitor Journal

Patient handoffs: The gap where mistakes are made

A patient handoff (also known as transitioning) is both the act of passing a patient between caregivers and the information exchanged between the sender (the provider giving away the patient) and the receiver (the provider taking the patient). This exchange is a huge weak point in healthcare; each handoff runs the risk of having key treatment information being garbled, forgotten, or not passed on.

Q&A: The hospital, the law, and the patient

Controversy flared this fall in Salt Lake City after police body camera footage of the July 26 arrest of University Hospital nurse Alex Wubbels went viral. This was an example of everything that could go wrong in a law enforcement/healthcare interaction. However, these two groups often have to work closely together. And if a patient comes in who is under arrest, providers need to know the extent and constraints of the law.

USP deadline on hazardous drug handling postponed until 2019

The U.S. Pharmacopeial Convention (USP) has announced it intends to push back the compliance deadline for USP Chapter <800> “Hazardous Drugs; Handling in Healthcare Settings” from July 1, 2018, to December 1, 2019.

Hurting silently: Assessing pain in nonverbal patients

How patients assess their own pain is a key component to how hospitals are expected to manage pain medications. But what about patients who can’t communicate their level of pain?

The route to eliminating hospital-acquired conditions

The newly released hospital safety report from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality tells an encouraging story: Hospital-acquired conditions (HAC) are on a double-digit decline. The study showed that these conditions decreased 21% since 2010. While that progress should certainly be commended, we shouldn't celebrate just yet.

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