Teaching
At any one time, more than 100 patients are in this busy and complex ED. Historically, staff actively tracked patients with manual entry of a patient's location into a computer system. Keeping track of such a high number of patients in real time was clearly a challenge given the ongoing…
The Problem Advocate Christ Medical Center's space in the admittance bay area and resource usage was unable to meet the increase in demand. An average GI patient experienced 70 minutes of total wait time, with 19 minutes of this wait time occurring in the procedure room. Only 24 percent of GI…
The ProblemMedication reconciliation—comparing a patient's medication orders to all medications the patient has been taking—helps to avoid medication errors such as omissions, duplications, dosing errors and drug interactions. The Institute for Safe Medication Practice estimates…
The Problem Inapproprate inductions of labor, defined as elective iductions less than 39 weeks gestation or whent he cervix is not readily inducible, have a negative impact on patient safety. It increases the risk of admission intot he NICU for the infant. The Solution An obstetrical task force was…
The Problem While all facitilites aspire to limit the incidence of ventilator-associated pneumonia, doing so within the confines of a spinal cord injury population presents unique challenges. In April of 2008, we had several patients, some of whom had spinal cord injuries and were on ventilators,…
Urinary tract infections are the most common hospital-acquired infection with 80 percent of these infections attributable to an indwelling urinary catheter (Foley). Logic follows if one can decrease the use and length of time Foley catheters remain in place, hospital-acquired urinary tract…
The Problem
Antimicrobial resistance is a growing problem nationwide, caused, in part, by injudicious use of antibiotics. At Hunterdon Medical Center, some antibiotics were losing their ability to cure infections present in patients coming to the hospital. For example, the effectiveness of the…
The ProblemAlthough Fairfield Medical Center had a fairly low rate of pressure ulcers, officials believed the incidence could be reduced further to improve patient care and prepare for Medicare's decision to stop reimbursing for hospital-acquired Stage III and IV pressure ulcers as of October…