Editor's Note The World Health Organization (WHO) has designated 2020 as the International Year of the Nurse and the Midwife, in honor of the 200th birth anniversary of Florence Nightingale. WHO and its partners are leading a year-long effort to celebrate the work of nurses and midwives, highlight the challenging…
Editor's Note Higher levels of nursing education and more certified nurses improved the number of patient falls in this study. Using data from the National Database of Nursing Quality Indicators from 2010 to 2016 from medical centers in Central and Southern Illinois, researchers found that with every 1-unit increase in…
Editor's Note For the 18th year in a row, US adults taking the Gallup Poll rated nurses highest among professionals for honesty and ethics. In the survey, 85% of respondents rated nurses’ honesty and ethical standards as “very high” or “high,” similar to 2018. The top five also included engineers…
Editor's Note In this study, researchers found that over a 3-year period, compared to no participation, participation in Medicare’s Bundled Payments for Care Improvement (BPCI) program was associated with a 1.6% decrease in average lower extremity joint replacement spending with no changes in quality, driven by early participants. When looking…
Editor's Note The Food & Drug Administration (FDA) on December 19, 2019, identified the recall by Smiths Medical ASD, Inc of its Medfusion 4000 Syringe Pumps as Class I, the most serious. The recall was initiated because of malfunctioning low-battery alarms, which may lead to an interruption of therapy. The…
Editor's Note Researchers at NYU Langone Health combined advanced optical imaging with an artificial intelligence (AI) algorithm to produce accurate, real-time intraoperative diagnosis of brain tumors in this study. Compared with the accuracy of pathologists’ interpretation of conventional histologic images, the results for both methods were comparable. The AI-based diagnosis…
Editor's Note The Food & Drug Administration (FDA) on January 2 identified the recall by LivaNova of its VNS Therapy SenTiva Generator System as Class I, the most serious. The recall was initiated because of an unintended reset error that causes the system to stop delivering vagus nerve stimulation therapy…
Editor's Note In this study from Israel, researchers found that surgical scrubs worn outside the OR were contaminated with a low bacterial load and only a small number of pathogenic bacteria. For the study, specimens were collected at the entrance to the OR from surgical scrubs worn by 133 surgeons.…
Editor's Note Johnson & Johnson’s Depuy Synthes and Israel-based Zebra Medical Vision have partnered to develop artificial intelligence (AI)-based algorithms for use in preoperative orthopedic surgical planning, the January 2 BioWorld reports. The algorithms would enable the creation of 3D models from x-ray images so that radiation risks and costs…
Editor's Note In this first-year analysis of a data capture system called the OR Black Box, frequent intraoperative errors, events, variation in surgeons’ technical skills, and a high amount of environmental distractions were identified. In 132 patients having elective laparoscopic general surgery: auditory distractions occurred a median of 138 times…