U.S. News & World Reports to Increase Role of Patient Safety in Hospital Rankings
U.S. News & World Reports will increase the importance of patient safety in the methodology it uses to score hospitals for the publication’s annual Best Hospitals list. At the same time, the weight given to “reputation” in the scoring will decrease.
Innovative System Ensures Reliable Care for Patients at Risk of Pressure Ulcers
Despite known and effective methods for identifying risk and preventing hospital-acquired pressure ulcers, pressure ulcers remain the most prevalent preventable hospital-acquired condition. Turning patients at certain intervals is a proven approach to preventing HAPUs, but this routine task is often delayed or skipped when nurses are drawn unexpectedly into demanding or emergent situations.
Qstream’s Mobile Platform Boosts On-the-Job Performance of Healthcare Workers
Qstream has announced that its mobile platform for reinforcing on-the-job behaviors of healthcare workers has been deployed by the five medical centers of the University of California Health Quality Improvement Network as part of a system-wide initiative to improve transitions of care during hospital discharge.
Press Ganey Acquires Technology Firm to Enable Real-Time, Point-of-Care Patient Feedback
Press Ganey, the leading patient experience improvement firm, has acquired On The Spot Systems®, a point-of-care survey technology firm that enables organizations to capture real-time patient feedback. The acquisition advances Press Ganey’s Patient Voice™ portfolio for health care organizations by adding Point of Care to existing modes of mail, phone, and eSurvey.
Infection Prevention
Recent features, columns and news articles on infection prevention from Patient Safety and Quality Healthcare: Industry News and Products 3M Makes Call to Action to Reduce Surgical Site Infections JCI, SHEA Release “Best Practices in Infection Prevention and Control: An International Perspective, Second Edition” Pharmacy OneSource Releases New Features for Sentri7 Patient Safety & Quality … Continued
System Monitors Patient Movement, Improves Reliability of Routine Patient Care Tasks, and Reduces Incidence of Pressure Ulcers
Quality healthcare delivery has never been more achievable. Our knowledge of human physiology and diagnosing and treating disease is comprehensive. The armamentarium of diagnostic tools, therapeutic modalities and patient monitoring capabilities is considerable. So why do adverse and sentinel events continue to plague healthcare delivery?
New York Metro-North Train Crash Offers an Opportunity
The deadly train derailment that occurred on Dec. 1, 2013, north of New York City apparently offers another example of an industry—or at least one heavily traveled commuter line—that is ripe to learn the lessons of safety science. With Dr. Lucian Leape’s discovery 25 years ago of the science of human error, healthcare began to assimilate knowledge from other disciplines and to improve safety by addressing the underlying, latent causes of error and harm. It appears that railroads would benefit from the same.
Grant Funding Available from AHRQ for Patient Safety Learning Laboratories
The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) invites applications for funding to support the creation of “patient safety learning laboratories,” described by AHRQ as “places and professional networks where interrelated threats to patient safety can be identified, where multidisciplinary teams generate new ways of thinking with respect to the threats, and where environments are established conducive to brainstorming and rapid prototyping techniques that stimulate further thinking.”
FDA Issues Proposed Rule to Determine Safety and Effectiveness of Antibacterial Soaps
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has issued a proposed rule to require manufacturers of antibacterial hand soaps and body washes to demonstrate that their products are safe for long-term daily use and more effective than plain soap and water in preventing illness and the spread of certain infections. Under the proposal, if companies do not demonstrate such safety and effectiveness, these products would need to be reformulated or relabeled to remain on the market.
Welltok Taps IBM Watson to Create Novel Health Optimization Service for Consumers
Welltok, Inc., the leading Social Health Management company, is partnering with IBM to bring a unique collaborative solution called CaféWell Concierge powered by IBM Watson to market. The new, easy-to-use solution will offer healthcare consumers the ability to identify personalized activities, health content and condition management programs to optimize their health and get rewarded for positive behavior change.