Delaware Tightens Oversight of Physicians
In July, Delaware Governor Markell signed a set of nine bills that tighten oversight of physicians and increase protection of children in medical care. Known collectively as The Bradley Bills, Delaware’s new legislation is the most comprehensive of its kind in the country and is named after a physician pedophile who got away with sexual abuse or rape of more than 100 children over the course of 10 years, while fellow physicians, hospitals, government agencies, and others looked the other way.
Patient Safety Top of Mind for Medical Center and Design Team
Patient Safety Top of Mind for Medical Center and Design Team
Health providers, architects, and planners collaborated to put patient safety at the heart of the relocation and expansion of a leading Northern California trauma center/emergency department.
Q&A: Quality, Safety, and Medical Tourism
Q&A
Quality, Safety, and Medical Tourism
After a long career as a clinician and medical informatics leader at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, Syed Tirmizi, MD, grabbed his passport and joined Quantros as vice president of international business development.
Look-Alike Drug Name Errors
Look-Alike Drug Name Errors
Is Enhanced Lettering the Answer?
Medication errors can result in significant morbidity and mortality and more costly care. Look-alike drug names that contribute to wrong drug errors are pervasive.
Improving IV Catheter Care
Improving IV Catheter Care to Safeguard against Deadly Infections
As recently reported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC; 2010), the incidence of bloodstream infections associated with central venous catheters (central lines) has dropped 18%.
Health IT & Quality
Health IT & Quality
Is “Meaningful Use” Meaningful?
Now that the “meaningful use” rule has been finalized by the Office of the National Coordinator (ONC), many organizations turn their focus to a rapid deployment of electronic medical record (EMR) systems in an effort to achieve transformation of the United States healthcare system.
Patient Safety on the Fly
Patient Safety on the Fly Technology and Teamwork
Picture this: You are a nurse on an emergency transport helicopter en route to pick up a critical patient who is intubated at an outlying facility. Upon arrival, you learn the patient has adult respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), complicated by septic shock.
First, Protect the Patient from Harm
First, Protect the Patient from Harm
Applying Adult Learning Principles to Patient Safety
“First, do no harm.” Today, unlike in the time of Hippocrates, evidence of harm may not become immediately obvious during healthcare interventions. For example, a lapse in attention while inserting a central line may result in a blood stream infection that becomes apparent days later.
ED Decompression
ED Decompression
Combating Emergency Department Overcrowding with Creative and Flexible Planning
To set the scene, imagine that it is a cold and rainy Friday evening in early January, and you are a nurse in the emergency department (ED) of the local hospital. Patients, with various complaints and levels of acuity, are being cared for in the ED’s 30 treatment rooms.
ASQ Healthcare Conference Seeks Presenters
Healthcare organizations from around the globe are invited to share their models of quality improvement at the upcoming 2011 Quality Institute for Healthcare (QIHC) Conference, May 16-18 at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center in Pittsburgh, Pa.