Supporting Safer Healthcare

Kevin Pho, M.D. asks, ‘Should nurses be fired for fatal medication errors?’ Some may think the answer is a no-brainer, but as Kevin points out, there are often bigger issues at stake.

You just heard at this morning’s CEO leadership meeting that a 40-year-old father of five children died in the Surgical ICU last night, hours after receiving medication intended for another patient. Everyone is upset. Questions are flying around the hospital: What does the family know? Who did it? What happened? What can we say? Would [...]

Patient experience, and thus patient satisfaction scores, are intrinsically linked with how a hospital or other healthcare organization handles its patient complaint and grievance process.  In addiiton to making good business sense, there are specific CMS regulations and Joint Commission standards that outline how hospitals and ambulatory surgery centers must manage patient grievances.  Lisa Venn, JD, [...]

CMS plans to add new patient safety measures in the areas of hospital acquired conditions and healthcare associated infections, to the Hospital Compare Web site in 2011. CMS also intends to begin utilizing displays of composite measures summarizing both process and outcome measures. This information collection request covers consumer research on displays, labels, and explanatory [...]

You may know the story of Taylee Blischke, a newborn who nearly died in April 2009 at Mission Hospital in Mission Viejo, California. Morphine was mistakenly given to Taylee, instead of her mother who was holding the infant. California investigators say mother and baby had IVs that were mixed up.  To add insult to injury, the hospital [...]

“I care for you, I care about you, and I know you in ways no one else does; I am your doctor. ” The physician patient relationship is unique, sensitive, and vitally important.  Imagine for a moment, that you are the physician who made the opening statement, and that the patient to whom you spoke those words has suddenly, [...]

One woman’s courageous response to a devastating sentinel event: My mother was critically burned during surgery in December 2002 when a topical solution was not allowed to dry before the doctor used a cauterizing tool. The entire experience was awful, but the worst realization for me was that nobody would listen. No one apologized, no one showed much [...]

The Pennsylvania Patient Safety Authority has issued it's latest Advisory Report.  The eleven-member Authority was established in 2002 by the Pennsylvania Medical Care Availability and Reduction of Error Act (MCARE Act). Based on reports of medical errors that it receives from hospitals, birth centers, and ambulatory surgery centers around the State, the Authority releases a quarterly best-practice and staff education report. The [...]

Do you or a staff member want to brush up on the CMS hospital requirements pertaining to patient grievance? A 20 question quiz on Patient Grievance has been added to the free interactive Healthcare Administration Quizzes available at Simple Data Solutions.com.  Stop over and test your knowledge.

The Quaid Foundation was established in 2007 by Dennis and Kimberly Quaid shortly after their 12 day old twins received an accidental overdose of Heparin.  I placed the link to the Foundation web site under the Patient Safety section of this site's blogroll at that time.   Several times since 2007 I have considered deleting the link because there were [...]