Medicine and Health Sciences Commons^™

The Relationship Of Patient Falls To Prevention Policies In Hospitals: A Case Study, Cornelia Branzan

Master in Public Administration Theses

There have been a lot of studies over the past decade on patient falls, risk factors, and strategies for preventing the falls. However, these studies provide answers for long term care; acute care and community hospitals need more specific interventions. Falls and their consequences are important for patients and families, health care providers, insurance companies, state agencies, hospital accreditation, and others. Furthermore, they are causing psychological and physiological injuries among the patients, take a greater time to recover, prolong hospitalization [15 days in Switzerland, Sweden, USA, Western Australia, Province of British Columbia and Quebec in Canada www.stopfalls.com )] and increase …

Food Service Trends In New South Wales Hospitals, 1993-2001, R. Mibey, P. G. Williams

Peter Williams

A survey of the food service departments in 93 hospitals throughout NSW Australia (covering 51% of hospital beds in the state) was conducted using a mailed questionnaire and the results compared with those from similar surveys conducted in 1986 and 1993. Over the past eight years there has been a significant increase in the proportion of hospitals using cook-chill food service production systems, from 18% in 1993 to 42% in 2001 (p<0.001). Hospitals with cook-chill systems had lower staff ratios than those with cook-fresh systems (8.3 vs 6.4 beds/full time equivalent staff; p<0.05), but there was no significant …

Cost Of Medical Detoxification Among Drug And Alcohol Users In A Private Texas Hospital, Alberto Coustasse

Management Faculty Research

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to estimate the costs of medical detoxification among patients with alcohol and substance abuse disorders.

Design/methodology/approach – The study data was drawn from a medical detoxification program in a community hospital in Texas. Secondary data analysis of 1337 cases from three years was reviewed. Age, gender, race, alcohol, cocaine, cannabis, amphetamines, sedatives, opioids, financial classification, cost, length of stay (LOS) and cost by LOS were analyzed using Kruskal-Wallis test and Mann-Whitney U-test.

Findings – The sample comprised of 42.8 percent women and 57.2 percent males. The mean cost and cost by LOS …

Evaluation Of A Preoperative Checklist And Team Briefing Among Surgeons, Nurses, And Anesthesiologists To Reduce Failures In Communication, Lorelei Lingard, Glenn Regehr, Beverley Orser, Richard Reznick, G. Baker, Diane Doran, Sherry Espin, John Bohnen, Sarah Whyte

Lorelei Lingard

OBJECTIVE: To assess whether structured team briefings improve operating room communication.

DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS: This 13-month prospective study used a preintervention/postintervention design. All staff and trainees in the division of general surgery at a Canadian academic tertiary care hospital were invited to participate. Participants included 11 general surgeons, 24 surgical trainees, 41 operating room nurses, 28 anesthesiologists, and 24 anesthesia trainees.

INTERVENTION: Surgeons, nurses, and anesthesiologists gathered before 302 patient procedures for a short team briefing structured by a checklist. Main Outcome Measure The primary outcome measure was the number of communication failures (late, inaccurate, unresolved, or exclusive communication) …