News: Action Items Aid in Making Patient, Family Engagement a Core Healthcare Value
A recent report from the National Patient Safety Foundation’s (NPSF) Lucian Leape Institute, Safety Is Personal: Partnering with Patients and Families for the Safest Care, advocates for patients and families to be active partners in all aspects of their care, as well as in healthcare design and delivery and in policy development and research efforts.
Health IT & Quality: WhatsApp: Lessons to Engage Patients
Information technology has achieved some amazing changes in consumer behavior. Over the last 20 years, companies have decreased their costs simply by transferring the work previously done by employees to consumers.
ISMP: U-500 Insulin Safety: It’s Time to Rethink Safe Use Practices
As the obesity epidemic continues and insulin resistance problems worsen, larger doses of insulin are more frequently required to meet glycemic goals. This has led to an increased use of U-500 insulin when dose requirements exceed 200 units per day.
Patient- and Family- Centered Care: Advancing Quality and Safety with Bedside Rounding
Principles of patient- and family-centered care (PFCC) have been ingrained in American culture since the days when house calls were made by the fictional Marcus Welby, MD, and the real Dr. W. Mayo (Clapesattle, 1990). It would be unusual for a modern medical practitioner to argue against these principles, but gradually over time, the practical application of patient- and family-centered care in clinical settings faded.
How Nurse Informaticians Are Transforming Clinical Care
In 1992, Microsoft released Windows 3.1, Johnny Carson made his final appearance as host of The Tonight Show, Bill Clinton was elected president, and the American Nursing Informatics Association (ANIA) was founded.
Nursing Analytics: Using Cost and Quality Information to Improve Patient Care
Patients in today’s healthcare system benefit from expert caregivers who are supported by advancing technology. The majority of patient care is provided by nurses, who comprise the largest percentage of the healthcare workforce, with more than 3 million nurses practicing in the United States (Health Resources and Services Administration, 2013). Health information technology allows nurses to better monitor patient status, communicate with patients, collaborate with team members, evaluate available care options, and determine best practices.
Infection Control and the Built Environment: No Easy Answers
For more than 160 years, healthcare providers have understood that aspects of the built or physical environment of hospitals may deter healing or cause patients to develop new health problems, including infections, even as they seek help for existing illness and injuries.
Three Pillars of Clinical Alarm Safety
Management of medical device alarms has been a persistent challenge for decades (ECRI Institute, 1974). Histories of surveys, papers, and other initiatives to improve alarm safety have been compiled (Clark, 2005; ACCE Healthcare Technology Foundation, 2006; ECRI Institute, 2008), and yet the problem persists.
Cloud-Based Imaging and Report Exchange Coordinates Patient Care
Nuance PowerShareTM Network, the industry’s largest cloud-based network for securely connecting physicians, patients, government agencies, specialty medical societies, and others to share essential medical images and reports is now available from Nuance Communications, Inc.
Record Hand Hygiene Observations More Efficiently
Failure to perform proper hand hygiene is one of the leading preventable causes of healthcare-associated infections. iScrub is an iPhone/iPod Touch application from The Computational Epidemiology Group at the University of Iowa.