Supporting Safer Healthcare

Ever thought about starting your own business? Entrepreneur, according to Dictionary.com is “A person who organizes and manages any enterprise, esp. a business, usually with considerable initiative and risk.” For the past several months I’ve been diligently working toward opening a small start-up, which should be ready for prime-time within the next couple of months. [...]

EM Physician writes about the fun she’s having filling out hospital credentialing/privileging applications in The Hospital Credentialing Process Dog and Pony Show.  To say the least, EM Physician is feeling a bit testy at the moment, and not entirely without reason. So, I’ve been filling out multiple hospital applications lately. It’s not uncommon for physicians [...]

On December 3rd U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt wrote a serious blog post about use of electronic medical records and e-prescribing.  He stated that the Bush Administration supports a requirement that doctors adopt e-prescribing and electronic medical records in order to get the full Sustainable Growth Rate update (HHS statement). Nearly everyone [...]

Grand Rounds comes to us this week from London.  Trick Cycling for Beginners, authored by a self-proclaimed "dissatisfied and stroppy junior psychiatrist working in the crumbling institution that is the NHS," hosts this week’s collection of posts, cleverly dispensed in haiku. Grand Rounds presents a weekly sampling of the best of the medical blogosphere.

Unless your business cards include the title Career Coach, you probably don’t think of yourself in those terms.  Maybe it’s time you did. Your daily responsibilities may involve patient care, medical staff administration, healthcare law, risk management, etc., but chances are you, at least occasionally, also fill the role of career coach. Do people come [...]

I’m featuring a brief article here from guest writer Lisa Venn, J.D., M.A., of Advocate Alliance.  Lisa’s topic is the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) proposed new patient grievance regulations for Ambulatory Surgery Centers. Ambulatory Surgery Centers’ Patient Grievance Process In August 2007, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) responded to [...]

If you’re leading a group through change (and leadership happens at all levels of the organization) you can expect people to respond in some fairly predicable ways.  Be aware that the roles they take on may shift during the process. 1.  Victim Acknowledges and accepts no personal control. Feels pushed along by outside forces. “Why [...]

I have the pleasure of working with a diverse group of people, most of whom are quite generous about sharing their knowledge with someone who asks, “Could I pick your brain?” The other day I asked just that question of a co-worker who has completely changed direction twice during her career.  Most recently she left [...]

If your hospital is like most, the process for handling patient complaints is not well defined.  Whoever hears the complaint or receives the letter generally does their best to track down answers and get back to the complainant. However, hospitals that participate in Medicare and Medicaid must meet more specific patient rights requirements in order [...]

Patient advocacy has been in the news quite a bit lately, and with good reason.  Healthcare is a complex place for patient and caregiver alike.  I often advise friends and family that being a patient sometimes means speaking up, loudly if necessary, or having someone on your side who can.  The wonderful story, A Baby’s [...]