FDA Launches Initiative to Prevent Surgical Fires
Washington, D.C., October 13, 2011—Surgical fires are preventable medical errors. To reduce the risk of fires, many healthcare organizations have developed tools, implemented strategies, and conducted education and outreach efforts. Yet there is more that can be done.
Cook County Health & Hospitals System Joins GE Patient Safety Organization
Barrington, Illinois, October 11, 2011—GE Healthcare Performance Solutions, a unit of GE Healthcare (NYSE: GE), announced that Cook County Health & Hospitals System (CCHHS) has become the newest member of the GE Patient Safety Organization (GE PSO), in an effort to continue their increased emphasis on a culture of patient safety.
Children’s of Alabama Selects iSirona for Medical Device Integration
Panama City, Florida, October 6, 2011—iSirona®, a provider of simplified solutions for medical device integration, announced today that Children’s of Alabama will implement iSirona’s device connectivity solution.
NPSF Announces 2012 Patient Safety Awareness Week Campaign
Oct. 4, 2011—The National Patient Safety Foundation today announced its 2012 Patient Safety Awareness Week campaign, Be Aware for Safe Care. Patient Safety Awareness Week will take place March 4-10, 2012. This year’s theme highlights the need for everyone to understand the importance of patient safety and to recognize the range of efforts being made to improve health safety in the US and worldwide.
Vocera Debuts New Communication Badge
San Jose, California, October 4, 2011—Vocera Communications, Inc., announced the commercial introduction of the new Vocera B3000 Communication Badge featuring enhanced durability, audio quality and speech recognition.
Connexall 4.3 Enables Industry’s Highest Level of Hospital Collaboration
Toronto, Ontario and Boulder, Colorado—From smart beds to HVAC systems, patient monitoring devices to RFID chips, electronic medical records to nurse call solutions, the ability send critical patient data across devices and systems is still a major pain point for hospitals.
InterimID™ Supports Patient ID and Downstream Workflows during HIS or Network Downtime
Sept. 29, 2011—Standard Register introduces InterimID™, a stand-alone solution for producing patient ID bands and labels with barcodes and patient demographics during system or network downtime. InterimID resides on the desktop where it is readily accessible to staff when the health information system or network goes down.
Story Power
Editor’s Notebook
Story Power
The patient safety community generally understands the value of stories as a way to honor the experience of people who have been harmed by medical error, to humanize efforts to improve safety, and to inspire the will to change. I had an experience in August that demonstrated just how powerful and disarming these stories can be.
Eliminating CLABSI: Progress on a National Patient Safety Imperative
AHRQ
Eliminating CLABSI: Progress on a National Patient Safety Imperative
At any given time, about 1 in every 20 patients has an infection related to his or her hospital care. These infections cost the U.S. healthcare system billions of dollars each year and lead to the loss of tens of thousands of lives.
Web 3.0 Data-Mining for Comparative Effectiveness and CDS
Health IT & Quality
Web 3.0 Data-Mining for Comparative Effectiveness and CDS
“Turbulent times” accurately describes the state of the American healthcare system. The list of critical challenges is well known—upward spiraling healthcare costs now approaching 17% of GDP, healthcare payment reform, shortage of clinical professionals, aging population, and the economic downturn.