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Illustrating the potential liability when a test result falls through the cracks, a Philadelphia jury recently awarded a widow $2.19 million in a malpractice suit against St. Joseph's Hospital and two ED physicians.
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Every risk manager wants to believe that the credentialing process has properly vetted all the organization's health care professionals to ensure that they are qualified and have no known criminal record. But that is not always the case. Too often, risk managers get a phone call alerting them that one of their staff or physicians has a problem that did not show up in the credentialing process.
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Testifying before a crowded hearing in Washington, DC, on the oversight of helicopter medical services, the head of a leading air ambulance organization recently promised lawmakers that the dismal safety record of the industry can be improved.
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News: A woman presented at a hospital emergency department (ED) with abdominal pain. X-rays and a CT scan were performed. The emergency physician discussed the findings with a radiologist who noted the findings in his report. The emergency physician noted the CT as negative and ordered the woman to take morphine and fentanyl. Twelve hours later, the woman was seen by a different physician, who reviewed the previous record but did not mention the X-rays or the CT scan.
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Patients with heart attacks and other forms of chest pain are three to five times more likely to experience serious complications after hospital admission when they are treated in a crowded ED, according to a new study published online in the journal Academic Emergency Medicine.
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"Every doctor in our group tries to put themselves in the shoes of the medical staff, and ask themselves what they would want done prior to admission and how they would want their patients treated," says Ben Johnston, MD, president of the emergency physician group at Morris (IL) Hospital.
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The medical literature shows that educating children and their parents about asthma can reduce return visits to the ED as well as hospital admissions, and experts say that the ED may well be the best place to provide that education.
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Physicians' personal notes about a patient's care. Incident reports if a patient is harmed. Information given verbally or in writing to the hospital's risk managers.
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According to Ken Braxton, JD, a health care attorney at Dallas-based Stewart Stimmel, ED physicians, when notified of a possible lawsuit or claim, should avoid all of the following actions:
