ED Management articles from February 2004

ED Management archives from February 2004

Avoid construction nightmares by taking charge of the process and setting rules: some disruption inevitable, but careful planning can make it bearable.
February 1, 2004... Executive Summary A construction crew in your ED guarantees some level of disruption, but you can keep your department functioning well by hiring contractors familiar with health care settings and establishing ground rules up front. *...

Increase capacity with chest pain accreditation.
February 1, 2004... If you already are working to optimize the care of cardiac patients in your ED, seeking accreditation as a chest pain center can be a good way to draw attention to your efforts, improve capacity, and make sure you maintain those standards over...

Headache, abdominal pain pose liability risk.
February 1, 2004... (Editor's note." This is" the second of a three-part series covering the top five issues that lead to malpractice claims in the ED and how you can address them. The January 2004 issue of ED Management addressed chest pain, and this month's...

Disease-specific certification links EDs to continuum of care, may reduce return visits by the chronically ill: educating patients to manage chronic illnesses can reduce number of future visits.
February 1, 2004... Your ED is geared toward delivering acute care to sick or injured patients, but hospitals that aspire to earning disease-specific care (DSC) certification are requiring their EDs to take a fresh look at how they treat patients with chronic...

Joint Commission warns of abbreviations to avoid: compliance urged by end of 2004.
February 1, 2004... Emphasizing the importance it places on eliminating easily misinterpreted abbreviations and acronyms from written orders and medical records, the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations has amended patient safety goals to...

Quick fact.
February 1, 2004... A medical student has no legal status as a provider of health care services. Therefore, a history and physical taken by a medical student would not fulfill Joint Commission requirements that the history and physical entered into the record must...

Accreditation Q & A.
February 1, 2004... Q. In light of changes to the survey process made last year, what does my ED need to provide to surveyors to demonstrate compliance with staffing effectiveness standards? A. Good news: This is a change to the survey process that is...

More core performance data required in 2004: measures for MI among those needing ED data.
February 1, 2004... As of Jan. 1, your accredited hospital was required to collect and report data on one additional core measure set as part of an expansion of the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organization's ORYX initiative. Emergency...

Delayed treatment causes most sentinel events in ED.
February 1, 2004... Delay in treatment remains the most common cause of sentinel events in EDs, accounting for more than half of all sentinel events originating in EDs since the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations began tracking the...

A billing analyst can find $300,000 for your ED.
February 1, 2004... A dedicated billing analyst for your ED can generate hundreds of thousands of dollars that goes straight to the bottom line instead of just flying out the window, say two managers who have added about $300,000 a year. And that's a net increase...

Coding study shows wide variance, undercoding.
February 1, 2004... More than a year after implementation of the Medicare outpatient prospective payment system (OPPS), there are "unexpected variances" in the assignment of evaluation and management (E&M) codes on claims from EDs, suggesting many are undercoded...

Medicare issues rule on smallpox damages.
February 1, 2004... The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has announced an interim final rule to identify and compensate ED staff and others injured as a result of receiving a smallpox vaccine. The interim rule for the new Smallpox Vaccine Injury...

ACEP endorses rules for avoiding wrong sites.
February 1, 2004... The American College of Emergency Physicians (ACEP) in Irving, TX, has joined more than 40 organizations endorsing a new universal protocol to standardize pre-surgery procedures for verifying the correct patient, the correct procedure, and the...

EMTALA Q & A.
February 1, 2004... Question: We have a hospital 25 miles away that can provide a higher level of critical care for trauma then what we can provide. We recently signed an agreement with them that allows our community-owned ambulance (basic life support) team to...

CE/CME questions.
February 1, 2004... For information on the CE/CME program, call customer service at (800) 688-2421. 25. According to Jackie Mueller, administrative director of emergency services and flight medicine at Florida Hospital, what is the goal for transferring...