Tragedy into policy: A quantitative study of nurses’ attitudes toward patient advocacy activities
As many as 115 patients may have contracted hepatitis as a result of the reuse of single use items in two clinics in Nevada. The 2008 investigation showed that nurses reused syringes, medication vials, bite blocks and other equipment intended for single use. Twenty two RNs and LPNs were investigated in connection to the hepatitis outbreak. Several are still under investigation by the Nevada Board of Nursing for alleged violations that included failure to safeguard a patient, failure to properly document, falsification of medical records, and failure to conform to customary standards of practice. Dr. Lisa Black performed a study of Nevada Nurses’ attitudes towards being patient advocates and the factors that held them back from reporting unsafe practices. She found that 34% of her sample (564 people returned the survey) indicated they were aware of a patient care condition that could have caused harm to a patient, yet had not reported it. The most common reasons for nonreporting included fear of workplace retaliation and a belief that nothing would come of reports that were made. Original_Research__Tragedy_into_Policy__A.23. From American Journal of Nursing, June 2011, vol 111, No. 6.
Clinical Practice Guidelines for the treatment of patients with methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) infections were prepared by an Expert Panel of the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA). The guidelines are intended for use by health care providers who care for adult and pediatric patients with MRSA infections. The guidelines discuss the management of a variety of clinical syndromes associated with MRSA disease, including skin and soft tissue infections (SSTI), bacteremia and endocarditis, pneumonia, bone and joint infections, and central nervous system (CNS) infections. Recommendations are provided regarding vancomycin dosing and monitoring, management of infections due to MRSA strains with reduced susceptibility to vancomycin, and vancomycin treatment failures. Clin_Infect_Dis.-2011-Liu-cid_ciq146
“You can’t kill my mother and get away with it” by Marshall Allen
AUSTIN, Texas — This is an insurgency no one wanted to join. The patient safety advocates who gathered last month for their annual strategy session were drafted by tragedy — a botched surgery, a preventable infection or some other hospital incident that launched them into battle to protect others from suffering harm when they seek healing. If America’s patient safety movement has a war room, this is it. The annual Safe Patient Summit organized by the nonprofit Consumers Union is where activists plot strategy toward their goal: nothing less than the reformation of America’s health care culture. Read more
This is one of a several part article series written by the Las Vegas Sun. See this video of the publisher of the Las Vegas Sun.
“Temporal Trends in Rates of Patient Harm Resulting from Medical Care“, New England Journal of Medicine, 11/25/2010. Read here
This new study reviewed 2,341 patients’ records from stays at 10 North Carolina hospitals from 2002 to 2007. The reviewers found that 25 harms per 100 admissions had occurred, and that 63% of these harms were preventable. Harms that were detected were a consequence of procedures (186), medications (162), nosocomial infections (87), other therapies (59), diagnostic evaluations (7), and falls (5), among other causes. The large majority of identified harms were classified as category E or temporary harm (144) or category F or an initial or prolonged hospitalization (163) harms. Of the identified preventable harms, 13 caused permanent harm (category G), 35 were life-threatening (category H), and 9 caused or contributed to a patient’s death (category I).
The authors concluded harm to patients resulting from medical care was common in North Carolina, and the rate of harm did not appear to decrease significantly during a 6-year period ending in December 2007, despite substantial national attention and allocation of resources to improve the safety of care. Since North Carolina has been a leader in efforts to improve safety, a lack of improvement in this state suggests that further improvement is also needed at the national level.
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Lies, Damned Lies, and Medical Science by David Freedman, The Atlantic, November 2010. Read here
Ready to change your diet or lifestyle based n the latest scientific study? Hold off. Much of what medical researchers conclude in their studies is misleading, exaggerated, or wrong. Why are doctors still drawing upon misinformation in their everyday practice? Dr. John Ioannidis has spent his career challenging his peers by exposing their bad science. He is one of the foremost experts on credibility of medical research. He and hsi team have shown over and over why much of research is flawed.
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How American Health Care Killed My father by David Goldhill, The Atlantic, September 2009. Read here
In this extensive critique of the American Healthcare System, the author described the needless death of his father from a hospital borne infection in the ICU of a well-regarded hospital in New York City. This stimulated him to begin a personal exploration of a the healthcare industry, and why it has delivered poor service and irregular quality at an astonishingly high cost. The author argues it is not worth preserving the system, and that he has a radical solution to fix an agonizing problem.
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Vanishing Point by Roxanna Robinson, www.more.com. Read here
Novelist Roxanna Robinson shared the story of the gradual deterioration of her mother into Alzheimer’s disease. The illness turned her mother into a stranger but did not completely erase the mother she adored. Alice Barry was well known to me (Pat Iyer) and I also watched her change, and her distress as her memory failed her. She was a proud, articulate woman, and her daughter uses the same skills to bring us into Alice’s life and the dilemmas created when a daughter becomes the target of a confused mind.
