HealthCare Benchmarks and Quality Improvement articles from January 2009

HealthCare Benchmarks and Quality Improvement archives from January 2009

Experts say PSOs will improve patient safety in U.S. hospitals: by assuring privacy, more data on errors likely to be collected.(patient safety organizations)
January 1, 2009... Experts in quality improvement say that the recent listing of the first 15 patient safety organizations (PSOs) under the Patient Safety and Quality Improvement Act of 2005 will help hospitals across the United States improve patient safety by...

Hospital cuts 30 minutes off ambulatory surgery LOS: two different units participate in the initiative.
January 1, 2009... The ambulatory surgery department in Glen Cove Hospital, part of the North Shore-Long Island Jewish Health System, has achieved its goal of reducing recovery length of stay from 190 minutes to 160 minutes with the implementation of a Six Sigma...

Study: C. difficile is very common in U.S. hospitals: earlier research underestimated number of infections.
January 1, 2009... A study initiated by the Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology (APIC), has shown that 13 of every 1,000 inpatients surveyed were either infected or colonized with Clostridium difficile (C. difficile), an infection...

Endoscopy center improves reporting of test results.(Clinical report)
January 1, 2009... The Endoscopy Center of Colorado Springs (CO) has won a national award for its improved system of reporting and explaining pathology results to patients. The program is a winner of a 2008 Innovations in Quality Improvement Award presented...

Constant analysis helps improvement team succeed: nurses, coders work together to assure accuracy.
January 1, 2009... At DCH Health System, the clinical documentation improvement team takes a proactive approach to changes in the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) documentation requirements. For instance, as soon as the current MS-DRG system was...

Home visits work for behavioral health patients: care coordinators offer psychotherapy.
January 1, 2009... When behavioral health patients who have been hospitalized receive interventions in their home, their compliance with treatment recommendations increases and hospital readmission drops, a study by PsycHealth Ltd.'s Home Intervention Program has...

Pre-admission prediction tool improves process: idea is to gain patient buy-in.
January 1, 2009... Sometimes the best response to regulatory and payer changes in health care is to improve the discharge planning process. And sometimes the best way to improve the discharge planning process is to start discharge planning before the patient...

New discharge form keeps satisfaction high: helps with instructions, resources at home.
January 1, 2009... For the past two years, the ED at Avera Weskota Medical Center, a small, rural critical-access hospital in Wessington Springs, SD, has been using a new "Emergency Services Aftercare" instruction form to help patients remember vital information...

CMS shifts claim reviews from QIOs to FIs, MACs: change will mean efficiency, consistency, it says.
January 1, 2009... Citing improved efficiency and consistency, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has begun transitioning the handling of hospital claim reviews from quality improvement organizations (QIOs) to fiscal intermediaries (FIs) and...

Cleveland Clinic docs name innovation 'Top Ten'.(Brief article)
January 1, 2009... Medical researchers are coming up with new discoveries at such a rapid pace it's difficult to keep up with them all, but physicians and consultants at The Cleveland Clinic try to sharpen our focus by shining a light on those that hold the most...