Editor's Note In this study, an outpatient fracture pathway greatly improved the efficiency and timeliness of care, and it reduced costs. A total of 187 patients during the preintervention period and 308 patients during the intervention period were eligible for the ambulatory pathway. Those managed as outpatients increased from 1.6%…

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Editor's Note The Joint commission on January 29 announced a new R3 report detailing changes to the Advanced Certification for Total Hip and Total Knee Replacement program. Effective July 1, there will be 11 new and 11 revised elements of performance (EPs) that will be applicable to all accredited ambulatory…

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Editor's Note Medicare may be overpaying surgeons for postoperative care they provide to patients, according to a new Rand Corporation analysis in the January 23 New England Journal of Medicine. The authors of the analysis suggest that federal officials should incorporate ways to more objectively measure the amount of postoperative…

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Editor's Note The timing of total knee arthroplasty (TKA) is important to optimize its benefits, but 90% of patients are waiting too long to have it and getting less benefits, and some 25% of patients are having it prematurely when the benefits are  minimal, this study finds. Of 3,417 knees…

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Editor's Note In this article, the American College of Surgeons and the Johns Hopkins Medicine Armstrong Institute for Patient Safety and Quality, which launched the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) Safety Program for Improving Surgical Care and Recovery (ISCR) in 2016, announce that they are expanding the scope…

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Editor's Note A survey by IMV Medical Information Division finds that the number of MRI procedures performed in the US rose 8% from 39 million in 2018 to an all-time high of some 42 million in 2019, the January 15 AuntMinnie.com reports. A total of 17% of respondents gave high…

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Editor's Note A virtual system for in-home physical therapy (PT) provided similar patient outcomes after total knee arthroplasty (TKA), with lower costs than traditional in-person PT, finds this study. A total of 306 TKA patients were randomly assigned to have traditional PT, either at home or at clinic visits, or…

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Editor's Note The Food & Drug Administration has granted 510(k) clearance to Aidoc (Tel Aviv) for its artificial intelligence (AI)-based system for large-vessel occlusion detection−ischaemic strokes that result from a blockage in one of the major arteries of the brain, the January 14 Verdict Medical Devices reports. The system’s AI…

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Editor's Note This study from the division of cardiology at Dallas’ University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center and the Yale School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut, challenges concerns about Medicare’s Hospital Readmission Reduction Program (HRRP)--ie, that it leaves patients more vulnerable and increases postdischarge mortality rates. Analyzing inpatient and outpatient…

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Editor's Note The Joint Commission announced on January 15 that it had launched its new website design late last year, with new features that include: a single sign-on for the multiple sites of the Joint Commission enterprise improved mobile viewing and navigation dynamic content organized according to care setting, healthcare…

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