Are Patients Getting the Best Possible Care Through Telemedicine?
Telemedicine can increase provider productivity by enabling healthcare professionals to see more patients in a day. In addition, it can enhance the work experience for providers, affording them greater control over their schedule and allowing them to see patients whom they otherwise would not be able to see.
Six Low-Cost ‘Action Items’ to Recruit and Retain Nurses
While nearly half (46%) of the 86 respondents to the management consultant’s 2022 State of Healthcare Improvement Report say that reducing labor costs provides the greatest opportunity for cost reductions, virtually all of the respondents (98%) say they’re bumping up starting wages, 84% are offering signing bonuses, 73% are offering retention bonuses, and 47% are paying for more overtime hours.
13.9% of Adults Who Test Positive for COVID-19 Experience Long COVID, Study Finds
The new research article, which was published by JAMA Network Open, features survey data collected from more than 16,000 adults who experienced a test-confirmed COVID-19 illness.
Frailty and Probable Dementia Risk Factors for Mortality After Major Surgery for Older Adults
The new research article, which was published by JAMA Surgery, features data collected from 1,193 major surgeries involving 992 community-living older adults from 2011 to 2017. The data was drawn from Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services fee-for-service Medicare claims and the National Health and Aging Trends Study. The definition of major surgery included any procedure performed in an operating room with general anesthesia.
Survey Finds Chronic, Widespread Shortages of Allied Care Professionals
A survey of 1,005 healthcare venues by the Dallas-based healthcare staffing recruiter found that 85% of respondents say they are experiencing a shortage of allied healthcare professionals “a great deal,” “a lot” or “a moderate amount,” while 82% report hiring new graduates over the last 12 months to address ongoing staffing shortages. Only 15% responded “a little” or “not at all.”
Executive Briefing: Medication Orders, Crash Carts, and Food Storage Lead Top Clinical Problems
Check patient units to ensure breast milk and other patient foods are stored correctly, encourage staff to reach out to providers if medication orders are not clear, and check crash carts for expired or missing items. Those are among some of the highest scored problems not associated with infection control or suicide prevention, according to findings by surveyors with The Joint Commission in the 12 months ending August 31.
Male Physicians Receive Higher Payments from Medical Companies than Female Physicians
The new research article, which was published by JAMA Surgery, features data from the Open Payments Database for female and male physicians who received the most payments from the 15 highest-grossing U.S. medical supply companies from January 2013 to January 2019.
Telehealth Diagnoses Match In-Person Clinical Visit Diagnoses in 86.9% of Cases, Study Finds
The recent research article, which was published by JAMA Network Open, examines data collected from more than 2,000 Mayo Clinic patients who had telehealth diagnoses followed by an in-person visit diagnosis for the same clinical concern in the same specialty within 90 days.
Blood Clot Prevention: Who Needs to Wear an SCD and for How Long?
The CDC estimates that almost 1 million Americans suffer from venous thromboembolism (VTE), also known as blood clots. VTE is a term that is comprised of two medical conditions: deep vein thrombosis, which is a blood clot in one or more of the deep veins in the body (usually in the legs), and pulmonary embolism, which is a blood clot in a pulmonary artery in the lungs.
Poor Patient Data Signals an Alarm in Healthcare Safety
While many of the above factors are monitored by medical boards, state and federal certification organizations, and even patients on social media, patient safety also is heavily tied to the quality of data used to make clinical decisions—an important but well-hidden variable. And the quality of patient data largely depends on how accurately patients are identified. Poorly identified patients are one of the main causes of safety issues in healthcare.