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How is Your System Supporting Overwhelmed Physicians?

Even though there’s more data than ever, few organizations have updated their processes for managing this information overload. But that’s beginning to change. Health systems are finding ways to ease physicians’ burden with solutions that include restructuring staff and putting tools in place to stem the tide of burnout.

From Snow to Achuff: Using Analytics to Drive Clinical Care

The importance of analytics in epidemiology makes a strong case that Snow can also be viewed as one of the founders of clinical visualization. In his work, Snow used statistical techniques and visualizations to make his argument, such as through his cholera dot map.

PSQH Innovation Award Winner: Cleveland Clinic Develops Algorithm to Power Early Warning System

The hospital and health system set up an early warning system (EWS) as a way to alert nurses to subtle changes in patient condition. But alerts alone aren’t enough, so they also developed an integrated workflow that supports patient assessment, contextual evaluation of clinical data, provider notification, interdisciplinary collaboration, and timely intervention.

A Lot Happens When You Report a Hazard or Error to ISMP—There’s No ‘Black Hole’ Here!

When ISMP receives a hazard or error report, it is entered into one of our databases and initially reviewed by an ISMP nurse or pharmacy technician analyst. Since most reports submitted to ISMP include the reporter’s email address, ISMP sends an email to the reporter to confirm receipt of the report and to thank him or her for reporting.

Risk Management and the Transgender Hospital Admission

These issues challenge healthcare providers and risk managers because not addressing them can result in a distrust of the medical team, a reluctance to disclose critical healthcare concerns out of fear of retaliation or embarrassment, and a greater risk of patient dissatisfaction and litigation.

Industry Focus: Q&A: How to Improve Patient Handoffs

These transfers can be as dramatic as air-lifting a patient to a remote specialty hospital and telling the EMTs that the patient thinks he can fly and will try to jump out of the helicopter, or as mundane as a nurse ending her shift and telling her replacement the patient has been taken off a certain medicine. In both cases, not passing on this information can potentially harm the patient.

Massachusetts Weighs Hospital Wayfinding Regulation

The bills currently working their way through the Massachusetts legislature would require the state Department of Public Health to set regulations that require all Massachusetts hospitals to meet certain criteria to ensure safe patient access at all times to an emergency room or department. These measures would include indoor and outdoor signage, indoor and outdoor lighting, and best-practice wayfinding.

Network Seeks to Reduce Drug Diversion, Increase Reporting Rate

So far, the network has tracked drug diversion at 90 hospitals, 28 nursing homes, and dozens of other types of healthcare facilities, including ambulatory surgical centers, assisted living centers, clinics, compounding pharmacies, medical laboratories, mental health facilities, pain clinics, rehabilitation homes, retail pharmacies, and schools.

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We Need Your Input On Patient Safety and Quality
by PSQH, February 27, 2020

Please take a few minutes to complete the survey by clicking on the link below. The survey results will be compiled in a downloadable report, with highlights published in the next print issue of PSQH coming in May.
Study: Low-Temperature Sterilization of Medical Tools is Problematic
by PSQH, February 27, 2020

Researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill tested the effectiveness of three low-temperature technologies, often used for plastic tools, against steam sterilization by simulating the impact of proteins and salts left on tools before sterilization.
Survey Highlights Pervasive Drug Diversion Problem in U.S. Hospitals
by PSQH, February 27, 2020

The survey found that 86% surveyed have met or know someone who has diverted drugs, with another 43% indicating their facility could be at risk of fines, bad publicity, lawsuits, or overdoses because of past or potential drug diversion cases.
Verma Raps Accrediting Organizations’ ‘Glaring Conflict of Interest’
by HealthLeaders Media, February 26, 2020

Delivering the opening remarks at the 2020 CMS Quality Conference in Washington, D.C., Verma said her agency is “looking at ways to enhance our oversight of accrediting organizations.”
HHS Unveils Strategy to Reduce EHR Burden for Clinicians
by HealthLeaders Media, February 25, 2020

The Department of Health and Human Services’ Strategy on Reducing Regulatory and Administrative Burden Relating to the Use of Health IT and EHRs, mandated by the 21st Century Cures Act, aims to reduce the effort and time required by clinicians to meet reporting requirements, record health information, and improve the functionality and intuitiveness of EHRs.

Get More News

How is Your System Supporting Overwhelmed Physicians?

From Snow to Achuff: Using Analytics to Drive Clinical Care

Study: Staff Will Work Through Illness Despite Sick Policy

PSQH Innovation Award Winner: Cleveland Clinic Develops Algorithm to Power Early Warning System

A Lot Happens When You Report a Hazard or Error to ISMP—There’s No ‘Black Hole’ Here!

Risk Management and the Transgender Hospital Admission

Industry Focus: Q&A: How to Improve Patient Handoffs

Massachusetts Weighs Hospital Wayfinding Regulation

Network Seeks to Reduce Drug Diversion, Increase Reporting Rate

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