DANBURY, Conn. — The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has cited Danbury Hospital for failing to provide its employees with sufficient protection against workplace violence. The hospital has been fined $6,300.
The announcement comes on the heels of the March 2010 attack, when nurse Andy Hull was shot three times by 86-year-old Stanley Lupienski, a patient at the hospital.
Yes, $6,300 isn’t much money, I agree. But I’d imagine it’s not good for admin careers…
*This blog post was originally published at GruntDoc*
From KevinMD’s medical blog, guest post by Toni Brayer, M.D., shares a story where a team approach in medicine is critical for quality patient care.
Dr. Brayer writes:
“Medicine is a team sport and it is only when the team is humming and everyone is working together that patients can have good outcomes. Hospital errors, medication errors, poor communication between doctors and nurses are prevented by adherence to protocols that everyone follows. It takes laser focus, measuring outcomes and a great deal of hard work to ensure everyone is pulling together in a hospital. The fact that these bedside nurses take the time to work on error reduction and patient safety is really amazing. Have you seen how hard nurses work? My hat is off to these dedicated caregivers.”
Dr. Brayer is exactly right when she writes “medicine is a team sport.” Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Health in 30*
There is a disturbing story in the Hartford Courant (via the WSJ Health Blog) on how Connecticut state lawmakers have helped hospitals keep medical mistakes secret from the public. It’s true:
The legislature in 2002 ordered hospitals to disclose all serious patient injuries “associated with medical management.” But after the first reports were made public, hospital lobbyists persuaded lawmakers to rewrite the statute in 2004, limiting the kinds of adverse events that must be divulged, and promising to keep reports secret unless they led to an investigation.
What happened next is predictable. According to the Courant, public access to data about hospital adverse events dropped by 90%. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at See First Blog*
I kick off this segment with a surprising twist: I describe a hospital error that I experienced as a patient in the ER of a famous academic medical center. And yes, I give a shout out to Paul Levy at minute 5 for his courageous efforts to reduce infection rates at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston.
There is nothing concealed that will not be disclosed, or hidden that will not be made known.
- Mat 10:26
The Internet may be fueling the fulfillment of an ancient prophecy – that there will come a day when nothing can be kept hidden or secret. Of course, early adopters of full transparency are regarded as reckless by some (potentially those who have something to hide?) and laudable by others (though they may be afraid to follow suit). In today’s Boston Globe there is an article about my friend and fellow blogger, Paul Levy. Paul is the CEO of Beth Israel/Deaconess, leading the charge to make hospital errors a matter of public record.
Paul writes about the errors made at his hospital (and many other subjects) in his popular medical blog, Running A Hospital. The blog won the “Best Medical Blog of 2007″ award, and he is the first (and perhaps only) hospital CEO that has adopted such a high view of transparency. And for that, I commend him.
In my experience, hospital errors are alarmingly common. Read more »
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