True or false: Adverse drug reactions, as well as medication errors, pose a serious safety risk to patients. Hospitals must have a process in place to monitor and provide care to the patient, as well as to report the error to the physician.

Every few months we like to send out a request looking for member success stories—a new policy, a successful way of addressing a top cited standard, a new quality initiative—that a member has been a part of at their organization and would like to let people know about.

Every fall, The Joint Commission unveils updated statistics regarding the standards and ­National Patient Safety Goals that have been causing the most ­problems with compliance out in the field. As in years past, the top 20 problematic standards have remained relatively stable, with some slight...

Last month in this space, we began our discussion of the latest round of changes from CMS, specifically ­targeting order sets, preprinted orders, and standing orders. Following up on where we left off last month, let's take a closer look at how CMS addresses cardiovascular order sets and end...