HealthLeadersMedia.com - Nursing News and Analysis

Colorado Hospital Evaluates Missed Opportunities in Rapid Response Teams

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 15:44:00 GMT

Over the past five years, rapid response teams have been brought to the forefront of American hospitals. Initiatives sparked interest in RRTs among hospitals, especially at St. Anthony Central Hospital in Denver, which developed its own RRT in conjunction with the IHI initiative.

Ten Ways to Increase Nurses' Time at the Bedside

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 15:04:00 GMT

How can healthcare organizations help their nurses spend more time in patient care? Here are 10 successful strategies.

Physicians Believe Employers Should Coordinate with Docs to Help Chronic Care Patients

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 12:15:00 GMT

Most physicians believe that employers should play a role in the health of their employees with chronic conditions, such as informing physicians about programs in the workplace that could help their patients manage heart disease, according to a poll conducted by the Midwest Business Group on Health.

Georgia Supreme Court upholds ER statute

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 12:02:00 GMT

A narrowly split Georgia Supreme Court has upheld a provision of the state's tort reform law that makes it extremely difficult for patients to recover damages in cases involving emergency room care. Plaintiffs' lawyers argued the law creates what is tantamount to an insurmountable legal threshold for patients injured by malpractice in hospital emergency rooms. But attorneys for hospitals and insurers contend the statute takes into account what happens in chaotic ERs, where doctors are often faced with life-or-death decisions without knowing their patients' medical histories, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports.

California health agency works with hospitals to reduce errors

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 11:43:00 GMT

There were 1,538 preventable medical errors reported at California hospitals last fiscal year, according to regulators at the state Department of Public Health. Regulators plan to release a report in coming months analyzing statewide trends in preventable medical errors, said officials from the public health department's Center for Health Care Quality. They also plan to spend $800,000 of the fines collected from hospitals this year on research and prevention of foreign objects left behind during surgery. Last year, the department spent $300,000 of the fines on assessing, among other things, whether hospitals are underreporting errors, the Los Angeles Times reports.

New focus on averting errors: Hospital culture

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 11:23:00 GMT

Errors made by doctors, nurses, and other medical caregivers cause 44,000 to 98,000 deaths a year. Hospital infections take another 100,000 lives. Now hospitals are taking what might seem like a surprising approach to confronting the problem: Not only are they trying to improve safety and reduce malpractice claims, they're also coming up with procedures for handling—and even consoling—staffers who make inadvertent mistakes, the Wall Street Journal reports.

Democratic leaders say health bill will pass

Mon, 15 Mar 2010 12:08:00 GMT

Democratic leaders tried to pull together enough support in the House this weekend for a decision on healthcare reform later this week, expressing optimism that a package will soon be signed into law by President Obama despite a lack of firm votes for passage, the Washington Post reports. Democratic leaders are struggling to assemble support amid opposition to the Senate legislation from conservative Democrats, who object to abortion-related language in the bill, and from liberals, who are disappointed about the lack of a public insurance option and other measures, the Post reports.

Project to get transplant organs from ER patients raises ethics questions

Mon, 15 Mar 2010 12:04:00 GMT

Using a $321,000 grant from the Department of Health and Human Services, the emergency departments at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center-Presbyterian Hospital and Allegheny General Hospital in Pittsburgh have started rapidly identifying donors among patients whom doctors are unable to save and taking steps to preserve their organs so a transplant team can rush to try to retrieve them. Obtaining organs from emergency room patients has long been considered off-limits in the United States because of ethical and logistical concerns, the Washington Post reports. This pilot project aims to investigate whether it is feasible and, if so, to encourage other hospitals nationwide to follow.

Patient-satisfaction surveys have drawbacks

Mon, 15 Mar 2010 11:45:00 GMT

Patient satisfaction surveys are being increasingly used in hospitals nationwide. Press Ganey, a leading organization measuring patient satisfaction, counts more than 10,000 medical institutions in the U.S., and over 40% of hospitals, among its clients. While gauging patient sentiment with satisfaction scores is a useful way to point out deficiencies and improve the patient experience, focusing too much on patient satisfaction actually be detrimental, says Kevin Pho, MD, a primary care physician who writes a column in USA Today.

Seniors Often Get Inappropriate Drugs in ED, Says Study

Fri, 12 Mar 2010 18:39:00 GMT

It is common for patients 65 and older to get potentially inappropriate medications when treated in emergency departments, a new University of Michigan Health System study has found. Nearly 19.5 million older patients, or 16.8% of eligible emergency visits from 2000-2006, received one or more potentially inappropriate medications, said the study.

UC Irvine Medical Center ordered to improve medication management

Fri, 12 Mar 2010 11:08:00 GMT

California inspectors making a surprise follow-up visit to UC Irvine Medical Center found two deficiencies in "medication management" and issued an "immediate jeopardy" warning, alleging that patient care was at risk, hospital officials said. In an email to staff members, UC Irvine Medical Center Chief Executive Terry A. Belmont said hospital officials already have submitted plans to improve care. Federal investigators have documented repeated examples of poor oversight at the hospital and previously have threatened to cut Medicare funding, the Los Angeles Times reports.

Nurse practitioners seek expanded role

Fri, 12 Mar 2010 10:40:00 GMT

Each year, Wendy Fletcher says, she and two partners see more than 5,000 patients at their practice in Morehead, KY. They are not doctors, but rather registered nurse practitioners who say they are able to increase access to healthcare and make it more affordable. "None of us are trying to play doctor," she said. The Kentucky Medical Association claims otherwise and is fighting proposed legislation that would lift some limits on the ability of about 3,700 nurse practitioners in Kentucky to prescribe medication and perform other, mostly routine tasks such as signing a child's immunization certificate or certifying the need for employee sick leave.

New Orleans coroner says Memorial death will not be reclassified as a homicide

Thu, 11 Mar 2010 18:39:00 GMT

New Orleans coroner Frank Minyard announced that he will not reclassify as a homicide the post-Hurricane Katrina death of Jannie Burgess, a 79-year-old patient at Memorial Medical Center who received morphine injections and subsequently died days after the storm. At a press conference, Minyard called Burgess an "extremely sick" woman and said that it was impossible to determine exactly the cause of her death.

Nurse Survey Finds Hospitals are Making Cost-Cutting Moves

Thu, 11 Mar 2010 15:14:00 GMT

A recent survey among 179 nursing professionals in the healthcare industry show how the tumultuous 2009 economy had varying effects on facilities of all sizes in acute care, critical access, long-term care, ambulatory, home health, and rehabilitation settings.

Hospitals Could Save Millions By Eliminating Five Hospital-Acquired Conditions

Thu, 11 Mar 2010 12:12:00 GMT

An average 200-bed hospital could save approximately $2 million annually if it eliminates common but high-cost hospital-acquired conditions among inpatients, according to the Healthcare Management Council, Inc., a Needham, MA-based company focusing on hospital and healthcare performance improvement.

Quantcast Panel urges more choice in birth after C-section

Thu, 11 Mar 2010 11:38:00 GMT

A National Institutes of Health advisory panel said that vaginal birth after caesarean is reasonably safe and should be more widely available. Such deliveries once accounted for 25% of U.S. births among women with a previous caesarean delivery, but have now fallen to less than 9%. Many women would like to attempt a vaginal delivery, however, and the panel's consensus statement is expected to increase their access to the option. The panel, composed of independent experts in maternal and child health, found that although both VBAC and planned, repeat caesareans posed a range of risks and benefits, women should be allowed more choice.

More Children Hospitalized With Severe Clostridium Difficile, Says Study

Wed, 10 Mar 2010 16:01:00 GMT

The strain of clostridium difficile causing severe disease in children has been increasing from 7.24 per 10,000 hospitalizations in 1997 to 12.8 in 2006, most of it during the latter six years, according to a new study. The study's author says the finding should prompt health providers to be even more careful with the use of antibiotics, which may pave the way for the dramatic increase.

One Year Later: What Have We Learned from H1N1?

Wed, 10 Mar 2010 12:24:00 GMT

It's been nearly a year since H1N1 arrived in the U.S. How has the healthcare system responded and is the nation any more prepared for a larger health crisis?

With warning, a hip device is withdrawn

Wed, 10 Mar 2010 11:12:00 GMT

Just months after saying it was phasing out an artificial hip implant because of slowing sales, a unit of Johnson & Johnson has warned doctors that the device appears to have a high early failure rate in some patients.

Nurses Say Distractions Cut Bedside Time by 25%

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 15:27:00 GMT

Hospital nurses spend three hours of a typical 12-hour shift away from the patients' bedside to complete regulatory requirements, redundant paperwork, and other non-direct care, a recent online survey of more than 1,600 nurses shows.