Editor's Note The Food and Drug Administration on September 12 identified the recall by Medtronic Xomed of its NIM Contact Reinforced EMG Endotracheal Tube and NIM Standard Reinforced EMG Endotracheal Tube as Class I, the most serious. The recall was initiated after Medtronic Xomed received customer complaints about obstruction of…

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Healthcare costs in the US have increased exponentially in recent years. Surgical procedures are especially costly. Cost control without sacrificing high quality care is the ultimate goal for many surgical practices and payers. Alternative practices and payment models have been explored to meet this goal. Episode-based payments, more commonly known…

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Editor's Note This study from Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, finds a severe decline in surgical procedure volumes across specialties during the peak of COVID-19, and after the peak and vaccine release periods, the overall volume did not fully recover. Of 129,956 surgical procedures analyzed during four…

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Editor's Note The Institute for Safe Medication Practices (ISMP) on August 11 announced the publication of its first set of safe practice guidelines to support perioperative medication safety in hospitals, ambulatory surgery centers, and other procedural locations. The new guidelines: Address best practices related to labeling and storage of perioperative…

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Editor's Note This study led by researchers at State University of New York Downstate Health Sciences University, Brooklyn, finds that patients having major surgical procedures within 8 weeks of a COVID-19 infection have a substantially higher postoperative 90-day mortality, regardless of symptoms. Analyzing data on 938 COVID-19 positive patient cases…

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Editor's Note The Food and Drug Administration (FDA), on July 13, posted a nationwide recall by Hospira Inc (a Pfizer Company) of one lot (DX9067) of Propofol Injectable Emulsion, USP (containing Benzyl alcohol), 100 mL single patient use glass fliptop vial. The recall was initiated because of visible particulate observed…

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Editor's Note This Canadian study finds that hospitals impacted by COVID-19 can reduce their surgical backlogs by scheduling elective surgeries on the weekends. Using machine learning algorithms, the researchers demonstrated that even after resuming their usual level of surgical cases, the wait list would not decrease without a substantial increase…

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Editor's Note US News & World Report on July 26 posted its 2022-2023 Best Hospitals rankings, highlighting the top 20 hospitals named to its Honor Roll for delivering exceptional care across many specialties. For the seventh consecutive year, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minnesota, ranked number one. Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles,…

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Editor's Note This study led by nurse researchers Linda Aiken, PhD, RN, FAAN, and Karen Lasater, PhD, RN, FAAN, at the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing, Philadelphia, finds that if New York state enacts nurse staffing legislation currently under consideration, many lives would be saved and shorter hospital stays…

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Editor's Note The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) on July 27 updated its Overall Hospital Quality Star Ratings for 2022—giving 429 hospitals a five-star rating, based on their performance across five quality categories, the July 27 Becker’s Hospital Review reports. There also were: 890 hospitals that received a…

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