Quality and Safety

The 25-bed Cochise Regional Hospital in Douglas, Arizona, is set to close at the end of July, after Medicare took the rare action of cutting off funding based on findings from several compliance and safety investigations.

Despite concerns about turning the obstetrical specialty into "shift" work similar to emergency physicians, the laborist trend is growing as hospitals seek to improve patient safety and physicians increasingly recognize they need help responding to emergencies.

Events included hospital and ED patients visits that could have been avoided under circumstances including better medication management, more timely.

While in comparison, no hospital on the U.S. News Honor Roll flat-out failed in other rankings, in many cases they received only average scores or didn't show up at all.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services quietly updated its database of hospital star ratings last week, and for many hospitals the news was good.

Though new transparency rules worried dialysis providers and prevention efforts are increasing, DaVita HealthCare Partners says the demand for the kidney-care services is still driving business forward.

Though antibiotic-resistant "superbugs" aren't new, their rise in U.S. healthcare institutions is leading hospitals to stock up on supplies to combat them.

Medicare applied the new quality measure to more than 9,000 agencies based on how quickly visits began and how often patients improved while under their care.

Medicare cost differences ranged from $13,806 to $20,809 over an episode of care among patients with multiple organ failure, those treated for circulatory, digestive and musculoskeletal and connective tissue conditions at a long-term care hospital.

The proposed regulations include a section on electronic health records and measures to better ensure that patients or their families are involved in care planning and in the discharge process.