HealthCare Benchmarks and Quality Improvement articles from October 2005

HealthCare Benchmarks and Quality Improvement archives from October 2005

CMS moving steadily toward P4P; quality pros express reservations: key issues include measures to be used, data collection challenges.
October 1, 2005... Recent actions by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), as well as comments from agency officials, make it clear that it is likely a case of when, not if, some form of pay-for-performance (P4P) of pay-for-quality system will be...

State report on HAIs yields sobering results: high number of infections reported in study.(hospital-acquired infections)
October 1, 2005... The first-ever accounting of statewide data on hospital-acquired infections, taken from 1.5 million discharges from 173 general acute care hospitals in 2004, shows that hospitals reported 11,668 confirmed hospital-acquired infections. These...

NQF endorses patient safety event taxonomy: organization's leader calls it 'a good first step'.(National Quality Forum )
October 1, 2005... Before long, the nation's patient safety professionals all will be speaking the same language, based on recent legislative developments and the endorsement by the National Quality Forum (NQF) of a voluntary system for classifying patient safety...

HCA nears completion of systemwide eMAR: a million medical errors identified and thousands of medical incidents already have been averted.
October 1, 2005... While most American hospitals and health systems have yet to take the plunge into electronic medication administration (eMAR), Nashville, TN-based HCA (Hospital Corporation of America) soon will complete the implementation of eMAR across its...

CPGs may not be best for older patients: comorbidities require more individualized care.(clinical practice guidelines)
October 1, 2005... Evidence-based medicine and clinical practice guidelines (CPGs) have become mantras of health care quality in the 21st century, but as a new study suggests, when it comes to older patients those guidelines should be used with extreme caution....

ICDs recommended for patients at risk for SCD: ACC, AHA give recommendation.
October 1, 2005... Updated heart failure guidelines released Aug. 16 by the American College of Cardiology (ACC) and the American Heart Association (AHA) give the highest level of recommendation that patients at risk of sudden cardiac death (SCD) be treated with...

WHO partners with JCAHO to eliminate errors.
October 1, 2005... The World Health Organization (WHO) has designated the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JCAHO) and Joint Commission International (JCI) as the first WHO Collaborating Center dedicated solely to patient safety. ...

Experienced docs get better angioplasty results.
October 1, 2005... A new study in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology finds that the risk of major complications from angioplasty and related procedures is much lower among patients whose doctors perform a large number of those procedures each year....

Study: high-quality care helps elderly survive.
October 1, 2005... A study in Annals of Internal Medicine indicates that providing high-quality care based on established quality indicators can significantly increase survival for elderly patients. The authors of "Quality of Care Is Associated with Survival...

Study models bird influenza outbreak.
October 1, 2005... Using a computer model to simulate an outbreak of avian flu in humans in Southeast Asia, a study in the August issue of Science suggests a combination of strategies including targeted administration of antivirals, quarantine, and...