Editor's Note Two separate incidents of data fabrication and manipulation involving Harvard University and its affiliates might be indicative of a much larger fraud problem in the scientific research world, Vox March 1 reports. The most recent of the two incidents happened at the Harvard-affiliated Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, which faced…

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Editor's Note US Representatives from California and Texas reintroduced the National Patient Safety Board (NPSB) Act, which aims to establish a public-private research and development team “dedicated to preventing and reducing healthcare-related harms." The March 11 announcement comes during Patient Safety Awareness Week, an annual awareness initiative focusing on the…

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Editor's Note Health complications and hospital readmissions are more likely for Medicare patients living in areas with primary care shortages. The findings, from a cross-sectional retrospective cohort study of data from 2015 to 2019, were published March 4 in Health Affairs. Specifically, the study showed that patients in areas with…

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Editor's Note The Smidt Heart Institute at Cedars-Sinai has introduced a pioneering device aimed at treating patients with difficult-to-manage hypertension, making it one of four institutions in the US and the first on the West Coast to make use of this technology, a March 8 press release published by Cedars…

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Editor’s Note ECRI and the Institute for Safe Medication Practices (ISMP) every year compiles and unveils a list of the top 10 patient safety concerns affecting the healthcare industry. The report highlights issues what healthcare leaders should focus on within their own organizations and opportunities to address preventable harm. The…

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Editor's Note Spine surgeons are sounding the alarm about high numbers of unnecessary fusion surgeries, according to a March 5 report in Becker’s Spine Review. Unnecessary surgeries refer to any surgical intervention that is not needed or in the patient’s best interest. A recent report from Forbes finds that 50%…

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Editor's Note A medical device developed by researchers at Northwestern University and Washington University School of Medicine could enable clinicians to monitor the health of a patient’s organs following surgery. The findings appeared in the journal Science on March 7.  Patients who undergo gastrointestinal surgeries—including pancreatic surgery—can develop anastomotic leaks…

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Editor's Note Patients with a history of obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) have a higher risk of delirium after high-complexity surgeries but not after those of moderate complexity, according to findings published in the March issue of Anesthesia and Analgesia.   The study included 46,352 hospital patients older than 60 years who…

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Editor's Note Patient engagement technologies (PETs) reduced length of stay (LOS), complication rates, and readmission rates among patients in a study published February 16 in the American Journal of Surgery. The retrospective cohort study consisted of more than 400 patients undergoing elective colorectal surgery from 2018 to 2022. Approximately 9…

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Editor's Note Compared with standard wound dressings, single-use negative pressure wound therapy (NPWT) devices can reduce the incidence of surgical site infection (SSI) in at-risk patients with closed surgical incisions across a range of surgical specialties, according to a data review highlighted in the February issue of the American Journal…

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