Baby name change could reduce hospital errors

More than 80 percent of neonatal intensive-care units, or NICUs, use temporary first names for patients — Babygirl Jackson or Babyboy Goldsmith, for example — a convention that may lead to errors in prescribing medicines. A new study has found that a simple change in this procedure can significantly reduce such errors. The NICUs at Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx instituted a new system two years ago. They started naming babies using the mother's first name — Jennifersgirl Jackson and Karensboy Goldsmith. Researchers compared the number of wrong-patient electronic orders of medicines in the year before the change with the number in the year after.