Category: Patient Safety

Top 10 Articles of 2016

Happy Holidays!

We’d like to wish you a safe and healthy 2017.

As we prepare for 2017, we reflect back on the top 10 articles from 2016.

Opioid Safety

  1. Physicians on Surgeon General’s Letter on Opioid Epidemic: Survey Results. The Surgeon General issued an Open Letter on the Opioid Epidemic. We looked into how clinicians and other patient safety experts felt about it.
  2. The U.S. Opioid Epidemic In Numbers. Related, Advance for Nurses generated an infographic summarizing your responses.
  3. 12 Years of Event-Free Opioid Use. In 2016, St. Joseph’s/Candler Health System celebrated 12 years free from Serious Adverse Events related to Opioid-Induced Respiratory Depression since the implementation of its continuous monitoring program.

Alarm Safety

  1. 3 Ways to Make Opioids Safer. Peggy Lange, RT, Director of the Respiratory Care Department at St. Cloud Hospital, discussed the importance of setting alarm thresholds for each patient in this podcast.
  2. Drawn Curtains, Muted Alarms, And Diverted Attention Lead To Tragedy In The Postanesthesia Care Unit. Sadly, alarms on the monitoring equipment used to alert healthcare professionals to changes in the patient’s cardiac and respiratory status were muted in one tragic death of a 17-year-old.
  3. A New Tool to Predict Respiratory Failure: An Interview with Hiroshi Morimatsu, MD, Ph.D. Could this multi-parameter indicator help counter alarm fatigue?

Bloot Clots Safety

  1. New PPAHS Campaign Targeting Orthopedic Venous Thromboembolism. VTE is the third-most prevalent reason for readmission after surgery, and about 1 million hip and knee replacement surgeries happen each year in the U.S.
  2. Physician-Patient Alliance Partners with World Thrombosis Day. As part of our new campaign, we partnered with World Thrombosis Day in 2016. Looking forward to working together in 2017.
  3. Why Bundled Payments for Joint Replacement May Be Risky for Patients. We took a look at whether patients are receiving evidence-based or reimbursement-based care under the Bundled Payments model.

Special Mention

  1. Why All Medical Schools Must Incorporate Quality Improvement and Patient Safety into Their Curriculums. This position by Molly Siegel generated plenty of engagement on the Twittersphere and is a theme that cuts across all of our priority areas.

Top 10 Patient Safety Must Reads – November 2016

We’re saying “hello” to December, and looking back at some of PPAHS’ top posts and tweets in November.

Top Posts

This month, as part of our new campaign targeting VTE in orthopedic patients, PPAHS was invited to become a partner of World Thrombosis Day!  We also provided bittersweet coverage regarding opioid safety, including celebrating St. Joseph’s/Candler Health System’s (SJ/C) 12-years event-free and opioid safety’s place – once again – on ECRI’s Top 10 Health Technology Hazards. Continue reading “Top 10 Patient Safety Must Reads – November 2016” →

Pressure Ulcer Prevention Tools Presented At ASHRM Conference

At a recent meeting of the New Jersey chapter of the American Society for Healthcare Risk Management (ASHRM), health experts presented on how to prevent readmissions for pressure ulcers.

Pressure ulcers are a common hospital-acquired condition with far-reaching implications for patient safety.  It is estimated that 2.5 million patients are affected by pressure ulcers annually in the U.S.; about 60,000 patients will die nationwide directly from pressure ulcers.  The condition is extremely painful, costly (up to $11 billion each year in the U.S. alone), and largely preventable. Continue reading “Pressure Ulcer Prevention Tools Presented At ASHRM Conference” →

Opioid Safety is again an ECRI Top-10 Health Technology Hazards for 2017

The ECRI Institute released its annual list of top-10 health technology hazards. ECRI’s top 10 technology hazards should be top of mind for clinicians.

By Sean Power

The ECRI Institute released its annual list of top-10 health technology hazards. These hazards have major patient safety implications and should be top-of-mind for all clinicians and hospitalists who use health technology.

ECRI Institute 2017 Top-10 Health Technology Hazards report cover

According to the authors of the report:

“Patients receiving opioids—such as morphine, hydromorphone, or fentanyl—are at risk for drug-induced respiratory depression. If not detected, this condition can quickly lead to anoxic brain injury or death. Thus, spot checks every few hours of a patient’s oxygenation and ventilation are inadequate.

“ECRI Institute recommends that healthcare facilities implement measures to continuously monitor the adequacy of ventilation of these patients and has recently tested and rated monitoring devices for this application.”

Last year, we interviewed Stephanie Uses, PharmD, MJ, JD, Patient Safety Analyst at ECRI Institute, to look at how hospitals and other healthcare facilities can prevent harm and death to patients with improved opioid safety. It is still relevant today.

Here is the interview in full.

You can also read the transcript here.

Physician-Patient Alliance Partners with World Thrombosis Day

The Physician-Patient Alliance for Health & Safety has been invited to become a partner of World Thrombosis Day, an international multi-organizational campaign devoted to increasing global awareness about thrombosis, including its causes, risk factors, signs/symptoms, evidence-based prevention and treatments.

World Thrombosis Day aims to highlight the need for action on thrombosis, specifically underscoring the unrecognized threat and serious consequences (morbidity and mortality) related to venous thromboembolism (VTE).

Continue reading “Physician-Patient Alliance Partners with World Thrombosis Day” →

Patient Safety Weekly Must Reads (October 28, 2016)

This week at PPAHS, we continue a new campaign targeting orthopedic VTE with a survey; help us by completing it and sending to relevant colleagues.  The latest #patientsafety news involves a new study on OSA, research into possible drivers of the opioid epidemic, and innovations in hospital design.

From PPAHS:

Announcing Survey on Patient Safety in Orthopedics.  As part of our latest campaign focusing on orthopedic VTE, we’ve designed a survey to understand current physician practices.  Help us by taking the survey and sharing with colleagues, and you’ll be entered into a draw for a $100 Amazon gift card. Continue reading “Patient Safety Weekly Must Reads (October 28, 2016)” →

Patient Safety Weekly Must Reads (October 21, 2016)

This week in patient safety news, we featured a guest post article on pre-op screening and assessment for OSA.  We also found some great articles addressing the ICU, the opioid crisis, and the latest in wearable monitor studies. Continue reading “Patient Safety Weekly Must Reads (October 21, 2016)” →

PPAHS Commemorates 5th Anniversary with 5 Tips for Patient Safety

By Sean Power
Community Manager, Physician-Patient Alliance for Health & Safety

Earlier this year, we marked five years since the founding of the Physician-Patient Alliance for Health & Safety (PPAHS) with five tips for patient safety. We’ve turned them into animated GIFs to give them further attention.

PPAHS marks 5-year anniversary

Continue reading “PPAHS Commemorates 5th Anniversary with 5 Tips for Patient Safety” →

Sorry for the Disruption!

To our followers:

Over the last few days, you may have noticed periods when our website could not be seen – a blank screen may have appeared on your laptop, computer screen, or mobile device.

We don’t know if we have been hacked or whether this is simply a software issue. However, be assured of this:

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Continue reading “Sorry for the Disruption!” →