Editor's Note The Joint Commission on November 7 released its 2016 Annual Report: “America’s Hospitals: Improving Quality and Safety.” The report, which includes information on how more than 3,300 accredited hospitals performed on measures of patient care in 2015, showed that hospital performance continued to improve, greatly enhancing quality of…

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Editor's Note The ECRI Institute has issued a white paper titled, “Responsive staffing and scheduling in aging services: A systems rethinking approach.” Problems in staffing and scheduling can lead to potentially dangerous conditions, which can cause performance gaps in delivery of care and services. To better address these problems, providers…

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Editor's Note This study from the Mayo Clinic found that intraoperative hypothermia was not significantly associated with surgical site infections (SSIs). Among the findings: Compliance with Surgical Care Improvement Project Performance Measure “Surgery Patients with Perioperative Temperature Management” (SCIP-Inf-10) overall and its components (maintenance of minimum body temperature and use…

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Editor's Note ECRI Institute (Plymouth Meeting, Pennsylvania) on November 7 released its Top 10 Health Technology Hazards for 2017. Several are specific to the OR. Topping the list is infusion errors, followed by inadequate cleaning of complex reusable instruments. Infection risks with heater-cooler devices used in cardiac surgery is fifth,…

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Editor's Note For older hip fracture patients, the care they received at a postacute care facility had a three to eight times greater impact on their long-term recovery than the care they received at the hospital, this study finds. Nursing home factors explained three times more variation in the odds…

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Editor's Note The World Health Organization (WHO) on November 3 released the “Global Guidelines for the Prevention of Surgical Site Infection,” which includes a list of 29 recommendations (13 preoperative and 16 intra- and postoperative). Included in the recommendations are: ensuring patients take a preoperative bath or shower no shaving…

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Editor's Note The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) on November 1 published a final rule that will allow providers in the Electronic Health Record (EHR) incentive program who previously demonstrated meaningful use (MU) to report to any continuous 90-day reporting period in 2016 and 2017 rather than a…

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Editor's Note The first national quality improvement (QI) program for bariatric surgery reduced readmissions by more than 30% for some hospitals, finds this study presented November 2 at ObesityWeek 2016, the annual conference of the American Society for Metabolic & Bariatric Surgery (ASMBS). The average hospital saw 30-day readmissions drop…

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Editor's Note As of January 1, 2017, the Joint Commission’s Clarification Process will change, with the goal to reduce the amount of post-survey work that has to be done to the Accreditation Decision Report. The changes will affect: Documents not available at the time of survey: Required documents not available…

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Editor's Note More than 1,600 hospitals will get Medicare bonuses in 2017 under the Hospital Value-Based Purchasing (VBP) program, which is about 200 fewer than last year, the November 2 Modern Healthcare reports. The results are concerning because fewer hospitals are getting bonuses and hospitals aren’t moving in the rankings,…

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