Using Six Sigma to Improve Patient Safety in the Perioperative Process

By Brian J. Galli, MS, PE; Nancy Riebling, MS, PMP, MT(ASCP); Corazon Paraso, RN, MSN, NE-BC; Gina Lehmann, RN, CNOR; Maria Yule, CNOR

In this project, the Six Sigma methodology was utilized to improve patient safety and compliance to the Time Out protocol and certain Surgical Care Improvement Project (SCIP) measures.  The project took place in the perioperative service at Huntington Hospital, in Huntington, New York. Six Sigma is an improvement science that utilizes a structured approach known as DMAIC (Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, and Control) and a series of improvement tools in order to identify sources of variation and to develop improvement strategies that would lead to the reduction of opportunities for defects and variation in a process or system.

Health IT & Quality

The Health Supply Chain

By Barry P. Chaiken, MD, FHIMSS

The shift to value-based reimbursement from volume-based reimbursement puts great pressure on organizations to obtain a detailed understanding of how they deliver care and what resources they use. Without a deep understanding of these issues, providers are unable to effectively manage care delivery and survive an environment of declining reimbursement.

ISMP

Patient-Controlled Analgesia

Fatal PCA adverse events continue to happen… Better patient monitoring is essential to prevent harm.

By The Institute for Safe Medication Practices

With this issue, Patient Safety & Quality Healthcare (PSQH) reaches its fifth anniversary, which prompts me to take a moment and think about how much the world has changed and stayed the same in the past five years. When we published the first issue, in July 2004, the patient safety community was discussing how much progress—if any—had been made since the IOM published To Err Is Human five years earlier, and now we are assessing progress made over the past 10 years.

Community Hospital Gives Its Discharge Process a BOOST

By Pam Cronrath, RN, MN; and Marisa Gillaspie Aziz, RN, MSN, ACNS-BC

The nation’s healthcare system recognizes the need to improve the coordination of care transitions (hand-overs) between healthcare providers (Bisognanao & Boutwell, 2009; California HealthCare Foundation, 2008). Emerging entities such as transition clinics, transitional nurses, medical homes, and accountable care organizations are examples of the healthcare system striving to improve care coordination.

From Blame to Fair and Just Culture:
A Hospital in the Middle East Shifts Its Paradigm

By Krishnan Sankaranarayanan MS, MBA, CPHQ; Steven A. Matarelli PhD, RN; Hasrat Parkar, MBBS, MRCGP; and Mamoon Abu Haltem MS, RN

The concept of a “culture of safety” emerged from high reliability organizations (HROs) such as in the aviation and nuclear power industries. The objective of HROs is to consistently minimize adverse events despite carrying out inherently intricate and hazardous work. These organizations maintain a commitment to safety at all levels, from frontline providers to managers and executives. Improving the culture of safety within healthcare is long overdue and is now becoming essential to preventing and reducing errors, thereby improving overall healthcare quality (AHRQ, n.d.).

Editor’s Notebook

Lessons Learned—A Book Review as a Small Test of Change

By Susan Carr

Writing book reviews on a regular basis is a goal I have failed to achieve for years. Wanting to write nothing but comprehensive, stimulating reviews, I too often don’t write them at all—a classic case of letting perfect be the enemy of the good.

Culture of Safety

How to Influence Accountability

By David Maxfield, PhD

This Q&A first appeared on the official blog of the Crucial Skills Newsletter—a weekly online publication from the authors of New York Times bestselling books Crucial Conversations, Crucial Accountability, Influencer, and Change Anything.