Category: Hospitals (Page 3 of 6)

Security Cameras Ensure Hospital Employees Wash Their Hands

December 23, 2011 / Staff

Proper hand washing is the easiest way to prevent the spread of illness.

100,000 people die every year from hospital-acquired infections, and many of these could be prevented if more medical workers simply remembered to wash and sanitize their hands.

North Shore University Hospital (NSUH) in Manhasset, NY, is one of only a few hospitals that has decided to take this more drastic measure to increase hygiene levels among medical workers — but it is one that has had incredible success. According to a controlled, peer-reviewed study on the hospital’s video monitoring system recently published in the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases, watching employees through the Big Brother-esque video monitoring system has increased the overall hand washing rate by nearly 1400 percent, taking it from 6.5 percent to nearly 88 percent.

Health Care Policy, Hospitals, Nurses, Quality Control, Research, Wellness

Hand washing Hand washing in hospitals hospital infections

Surgeons Don’t Discuss Post Operative Options With Their Patients.

December 18, 2011 / Staff

Surgeons don’t discuss options with their patients.

The survey’s results, published in the Annals of Surgery, found that more than four out of every five surgeons discussed which forms of life support the patients would like to limit. But only about one half specifically asked about the patient’s advance directive, which can include restricting the use of feeding tubes and ventilators to keep a person alive.

Wen it comes down to specifics, surgeons are reluctant to discuss directives which could greatly impact the care received if a surgery fails.

Patients could be kept alive against their will leaving families with crippling medical bills.

Doctors, Health Care Policy, Hospitals, Quality Control

living wills patient relations patient's rights surgeons

Hospitals and Alternative Health Care Options

November 29, 2011 / Staff

Hospitals are beginning to offer alternative health care.

You may not be able to choose untested herbal treatments but alternative therapies with a history of positive results are beginning to show up in hospital services.

What hospitals choose to offer runs the gamut, from well-known therapies such as acupuncture to less familiar treatments like reiki, in which practitioners channel a patient’s energy by placing their hands on or just above specific locations on the body.
Patient demand is the top reason hospitals offer complementary and alternative therapies, cited by 85 percent. Clinical effectiveness? That comes in second, at 70 percent.

Hospitals, Research, Resources, Wellness

Alternative care alternative health care options alternative medicine health care choices health care options health care reform

Living Wills a Touchy Subject for Baby Boomers

November 19, 2011 / Staff

Baby boomers avoid making living wills because they feel too young and healthy.

Who can even think of writing a will between yoga class and triathlon training?

Kathy Brandt says wills and health care proxies are a good idea for everyone whether they are healthy and young or older and not so healthy.
Brandt, a senior vice president at the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization, said the two documents can spare families a painful fight and ensure that patients receive — or don’t receive — the medical treatment they wish should they end up in a situation where they can’t speak for themselves

Saving loved ones from making the tough decisions as we age could be the kindest gift of all at the end of our lives.

Doctors, Health Care Policy, Hospitals, Medicare, Quality Control, Research, Resources, Wellness

baby boomers end of life care end of life counceling health care proxy hospice care living wills

A Fertilized Egg is a Person?

November 5, 2011 / Staff

If the 26th amendment in Mississippi passes it is.

The beginning of personhood?

Because the amendment would define a fertilized egg as a person with full legal rights, it could have an impact on a woman’s ability to get the morning-after pill or birth control pills that destroy fertilized eggs, and it could make in vitro fertilization treatments more difficult because it could become illegal to dispose of unused fertilized eggs. This could lead to a nationwide debate about women’s rights and abortion while setting up a possible challenge to the landmark Roe v. Wade case, which makes abortion legal.

The vote is upcoming in Mississippi to declare a fertilized ovum; human egg, a person.

The implications are vast and the arguments many, but in a state with the highest teenage pregnancy and STD rates it looks like the amendment will pass.

Physicians, scientists, women and hospital staff will face a host challenges to deal with the care of patients if this amendment passes.

There are great arguments on both sides.

Considering all the possibilities a new branch of legal practice may be necessary.

Doctors, Health Care Policy, Health Insurance, Hospitals, Medicaid, Nurses, Privacy, Quality Control, Research, Resources, Wellness

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