The Journal Blog
The blog of The Joint Commission Journal on Quality and Patient Safety features news and comments from the Journal’s Executive Editor, Steven Berman, and provides readers with an online forum to share opinions, concerns, and ideas about issues and approaches in improving quality and patient safety.

- 3/13/2010
- Author: Steven Berman
- 36 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
To follow up on my previous blog, the deficiencies in patient safety education described in the Lucian Leape Institute report, Unmet Needs: Teaching Physicians to Provide Safe Patient Care, are reflected in another Journal article—cited yesterday in an article in the New York Times, “Learning to Keep Patients Safe in a Culture of Fear” (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/11/health/11chen.html?emc=...
more >>
- 3/12/2010
- Author: Steven Berman
- 28 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
On March 11, 2010, the Lucian Leape Institute at the National Patient Safety Foundation released a report that finds that medical schools are failing to do an adequate job of “facilitating student understanding of basic knowledge and the development of skills required for the provision of safe patient care,” resulting in greater risk to patients. Lucian L. Leape, M.D., chair of the Institute, ...
more >>
- 3/5/2010
- Author: Steven Berman
- 136 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
In his January 29, 2010 guest blog, Kurt Herzer commented on the two recent investigative articles in the New York Times on the incidence and impact of rare accidents in radiation therapy. Shortly after, the American Society for Radiation Oncology issued a six-point plan for improving safety and quality and reducing the chances of medical errors—including working with oth...
more >>
- 2/24/2010
- Author: Steven Berman
- 270 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
As you may know, The Joint Commission has recently invited nominations for the 2010 John M. Eisenberg Patient Safety and Quality Award. Information about the awards and the and nomination process can be found at
http://www.jointcommission.org/PatientSafety/EisenbergAward/
.
Every year since 2002, when John M. Eisenberg died, it has been an honored ...
more >>
- 2/12/2010
- Author: Steven Berman
- 1147 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
This week, Peter Mills, the senior author of " A Checklist to Identify Inpatient Suicide Hazards in Veterans Affairs Hospitals,” which appears in the February 2010 issue, guests on the Journal blog. In the article, Dr Mills and his colleagues report on the first study to examine the implementation and effectiveness of a standardized checklist for mental health units. Dr. Mills, a...
more >>
- 2/4/2010
- Author: Steven Berman
- 1527 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
A Case Where What Is Good for Doctors May Also Be Good for Patients
This week, Jonathan A. Bernstein, the lead author of “Improved Physician Work Flow after Integrating Sign-out Notes into the Electronic Medical Record,” which appears in the February 2010 issue, guests on the Journal blog. As the authors reported in t...
more >>
- 1/29/2010
- Author: Steven Berman
- 3019 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
2:22:04 PM
This week, I asked Kurt R. Herzer, Marshall Scholar, University of Oxford, and Woodrow Wilson Research Fellow, Johns Hopkins University, to guest on the Journal blog. Mr. Herzer comments on two recent investigative articles in the New York Times reporting on the incidence and impact of rare accidents in radiation therapy, many of which can cause irrev...
more >>
- 1/22/2010
- Author: Steven Berman
- 2276 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
This week, Michael DeVita, M.D., chief editor of the Journal’s department Rapid Response Systems: The Stories, which began in the July 2006 issue, guests on the blog. Dr DeVita, Professor of both Critical and Internal Medicine in the University of Pittsburgh’s School of Medicine and Executive Vice President of Medical Affairs for West Penn Allegheny Health System, refle...
more >>
- 1/14/2010
- Author: Steven Berman
- 2644 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
This week, Peter Kaboli, the senior author of “The Veterans Affairs Shift Change Physician-to-Physician Handoff Project,” which appears in the February 2010 issue, guests on the
Journal blog. The development team designed an electronic medical record (EMR) handoff tool to provide a standardized approach to handoff commun...
more >>
- 10/29/2009
- Author: Steven Berman
- 6934 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
This week, Alpesh Amin, author (with Steven Deitelzweig) of “Optimizing the Prevention of Venous Thromboembolism: Recent Quality Initiatives and Strategies to Drive Improvement,” which published in the November 2009 issue, guests on the blog. In the article, they review the quality indicators, public reporting initiatives, incentive programs, and “negative rei...
more >>
- 10/16/2009
- Author: Steven Berman
- 7565 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
This week, Mark Bittle, lead author of "Engaging the Patient as Observer to Promote Hand Hygiene Compliance in Ambulatory Care,” which appeared in the October 2009 issue, guests on the blog .In the article, Dr. Bittle and Suzanne LaMarche describe how involving the patient is a simple and cost-effective way to monitor hand hygiene in the ambulatory setting. In this blog, Dr...
more >>
- 10/9/2009
- Author: Steven Berman
- 7919 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
This week, Randy Peto, lead author of "One System’s Journey in Creating a Disclosure and Apology Program,” which appeared in the October 2009 issue, guests on the blog. In the article, Dr. Peto and his colleagues describe the disclosure and apology program at the four-hospital Baystate Health system. In this blog, Dr. Peto discusses his experience, which occurred while the artic...
more >>
- 10/1/2009
- Author: Steven Berman
- 8486 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
This week, Sean Berenholtz, the lead author of “Implementing Standardized Operating Room Briefings and Debriefings at a Large Regional Medical Center,” which appeared in the July 2009 issue, guests on the Journal blog. Briefings and debriefings involve a discussion among all members of the surgical team before incision and then before leaving the OR. Drawing on 37,113 briefings a...
more >>
- 9/29/2009
- Author: Steven Berman
- 8598 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
The Journal has been running articles in Rapid Response Systems: The Stories, since this department premiered in July 2006. As Michael DeVita, the chief editor of the series then remarked (see article, attached), we launched the series “to provide a resource to those who are just getting started or are interested in advancing their programs already underway.” I encourage you, as he did t...
more >>
- 9/17/2009
- Author: Steven Berman
- 9133 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
This week, John Q. Young, author (with Robert M. Wachter) of “Applying Toyota Production System Principles to a Psychiatric Hospital: Making Transfers Safer and More Timely,” which appeared in the September 2009 issue, guests on the blog. As you may remember, they described how Langley Porter Psychiatric Hospital and Clinics at the University of California San Francis...
more >>
- 9/10/2009
- Author: Steven Berman
- 9312 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
Today, at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., The Joint Commission announced its Center for Transforming Healthcare. In a letter sent to more than 16,000 accredited health care organizations or programs across the United States, Mark R. Chassin, M.D., M.P.P., M.P.H., President of The Joint Commission, stated, “The Center is developing solutions by using the same Robust Process Improve...
more >>
- 8/13/2009
- Author: Steven Berman
- 11449 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
This week, Allen Hsiao, the lead author of “Dropping the Baton During the Handoff from ED to Primary Care: Pediatric Asthma Continuity Errors,” which appears in the September 2009 issue, guests on the Journal blog. As part of the AHRQ-sponsored “Electronic Records to Improve Care for Children” (ERICCA) project, the authors examined the handoff of care for asthmatic children betw...
more >>
- 7/23/2009
- Author: Steven Berman
- 11415 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
This week, Richard Averill, the lead author of Forum, “Hospital Complications: Linking Payment Reduction to Preventability,” which appeared in the May 2009 issue, guests on the Journal blog. As you’ll recall, in the article, Mr. Averill and his colleagues proposed that the Center for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) policy of denying payment for certain in-hospital complica...
more >>
- 7/17/2009
- Author: Steven Berman
- 11602 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
This week, Frederick North, the lead author of a Tool Tutorial, “E-Surveys as a Practical Enhancement to Tracer Methodology for Continuous Joint Commission Accreditation Readiness, “which appears in the August 2009 issue, guests on the Journal blog. In the article’s conclusion, the authors stated, “We now have regular interdisciplinary group meetings with physician, nursing, secretarial...
more >>
- 7/10/2009
- Author: Steven Berman
- 11460 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
Quality and patient safety professionals and clinicians need to have useful and efficient tools at their disposal to collect data to identify opportunities for improvement and to then address them. In an article in the October 2008 issue of the Journal, “Developing Process-Support Tools for Patient Safety: Finding the Balance Between Validity and Feasibility,” Jill Marsteller and her coauthors...
more >>
- 7/2/2009
- Author: Steven Berman
- 11960 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
This week, Urmimala Sarkar, the lead author of “Refocusing the Lens: Patient Safety in Ambulatory Chronic Disease Care,” which appears in the July 2009 issue, guests on the Journal blog. She reflects on the origins of the article and on the need to engage patients, especially the large population of patients with chronic conditions, in improving safety. D...
more >>
- 6/22/2009
- Author: Steven Berman
- 12619 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
In my recent blog regarding the new Joint Commission Resources book, A Guide to The Joint Commission's Medication Management Standards, Second Edition. I noted Brigham and Women's Hospital (Boston)'s efforts to improve medication safety. I recently had the opportunity to chat with the hospital's executive director of pharmacy, Bill Churchill, who took the lead with his team in writing the chap...
more >>
- 6/15/2009
- Author: Steven Berman
- 14174 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
We at Joint Commission Resources have just published A Guide to The Joint Commission’s Medication Management Standards, Second Edition. In developing the book, I asked a number of hospitals and other health care organizations to describe medication management practices that they improved to address The Joint Commission standards. I vetted the topics to ensure that they would provide educationa...
more >>
- 6/9/2009
- Author: Steven Berman
- 13165 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
Have you heard about the Joint Commission Resources audioconference scheduled for June 12, 2 p.m. C.S. T., on Reducing Antibiotic Resistance and Multidrug-Resistant Organisms? Hospital executives and their leadership teams are invited to learn more about the clinical and financial cost of antibiotic resistance and effective prevention and control techniques. (Registration can be conducted at http:...
more >>
- 4/30/2009
- Author: Steven Berman
- 15893 Views
- 0 Comments
-
Read More
Frequently, I will be asking authors of articles published in The Joint Commission Journal on Quality and Patient Safety to “guest” on the blog to provide “the story behind the story.” Laura Damshroder, one of the authors of “How Active Resisters and Organizational Constipators Aff...
more >>
- 4/21/2009
- Author: Steven Berman
- 15650 Views
- 1 Comments
-
Read More
Greetings! I’m Steven Berman. For 20 years, I’ve had the privilege to not only witness but also participate in the tremendous growth of the field of quality and patient safety in health care. When I first started, the Joint Commission—in fact it was still the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Hospitals—journal was called Quality Review Bulletin. Later, we called it o...
more >>
More resources for The Journal: • Home • Current Issue • About • FAQ • Index • Subscribe • Online Access • Contact
|