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A root-cause analysis points to a lack of redundancy as the critical failure that allowed organs to be transplanted into a patient with the wrong blood type, according to information from Duke University in Durham, NC, the site of a recent notorious sentinel event.
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Clinical pathways often are hailed as a premier quality improvement tool, but they also are seen as pie-in-the-sky solutions because they dont do any good if clinicians dont actually use them after all the fanfare of introducing them.
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Question: Does the Joint Commissions standard on spiritual assessment apply only to behavioral health or to all health care settings? What are we expected to do in making this spiritual assessment?
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URAC in Washington, DC, recently released a set of Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) Privacy Accreditation standards for public comment. When completed later this year, the new program is intended to help health care organizations display a commitment to fair information practices, and to demonstrate that they have taken the necessary steps to protect health information privacy.
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Obtaining prescription drugs for patients who cant afford them has been a problem for Athens (GA) Regional Medical Center for the 18 years that Beverly A. Baker, CRC, CCM, has been with the hospital, she says. The situation changed dramatically for the better about a year and a half ago.
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With the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations recent emphasis on investigating nosocomial infections as sentinel events, now is the time to start planning how you will coordinate a root-cause analysis with your organizations infection control professionals.
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Tommy G. Thompson, secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), recently announced the adoption of final security standards for protecting individually identifiable health information when it is maintained or transmitted electronically.
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Service quality is a high priority for most health care organizations. Unfortunately, failures in service and, therefore, concerns are inevitable due to the number of variables and perceptions involved in health care delivery. Feedback and learning from concerns is a key ingredient for achieving service excellence.
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A social work professional at a 100-bed hospital in Indiana is getting free medications for patients who cant afford them with a program she says could be a model for health care organizations across the country.
