Patient safety under scrutiny

The Joint Commission is mandating low-cost strategies for reducing medical errors.

By Andis Robeznieks, AMNews staff. Aug. 26, 2002.

Failure to institute "a culture of safety" is no longer an option for health care organizations, because the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations is ordering them to get serious about reducing medical errors -- or else.

Next year, when the Joint Commission conducts its on-site surveys, patient-safety programs will receive more scrutiny than ever. Survey teams will check to see whether facilities have implemented 11 recommended procedures (or suitable alternatives) geared toward achieving the following patient-safety improvement goals:

• More accurate patient identification and better communication among caregivers.
• Safer use of high-alert medications and infusion pumps.
• More effective systems for clinical alarms.
• Elimination of wrong-site, wrong-patient and wrong-procedure surgeries.

Failure to follow this directive could lead to a citation and possible loss of the Joint Commission's seal of approval. "If you don't remedy, your accreditation is at risk," said Joint Commission president Dennis O'Leary, MD.

Dr. O'Leary stressed there is little or no cost associated with the recommendations, which include standardizing abbreviations to improve written communication and implementing preventive maintenance and testing programs. [...]