The PSNet Collection: All Content

The AHRQ PSNet Collection comprises an extensive selection of resources relevant to the patient safety community. These resources come in a variety of formats, including literature, research, tools, and Web sites. Resources are identified using the National Library of Medicine’s Medline database, various news and content aggregators, and the expertise of the AHRQ PSNet editorial and technical teams.

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Displaying 1 - 20 of 186 Results

Better off at home--how we fail children with complex medical conditions.

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Newcomer CA. N Engl J Med. 2023;388:198-200.

Children with complex care needs present unique challenges for both parents and clinical teams. This commentary offers a physician-parent’s perspective on weaknesses in the care system that decreased medication safety for her child and also decreased patient-centeredness, including lack of a respect for the family as care team members.

Bleeding and in pain, a pregnant woman in Louisiana couldn’t get answers.

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Westwood R. Kaiser Health News. January 12, 2023.

Lack of access to obstetric care impedes safe treatment for mothers. This story describes challenges one mother experienced in finding care during a miscarriage due to abortion policies and the steps she and her family took to manage her condition.

ER doctors misdiagnose patients with unusual symptoms.

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Abelson R. New York Times. December 15, 2022.

Emergency department safety is challenged by factors such as production pressure, burnout, and overcrowding. This news article provides context for the 2022 AHRQ report Diagnostic Errors in the Emergency Department: A Systematic Review from the Johns Hopkins Medicine Evidence-based Practice Center (EPC) which synthesized the number of patients harmed while seeking emergency care.

During in-flight emergencies, sometimes airlines’ medical kits fall short.

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Ramachandran V. Kaiser Health News. January 6, 2023.

Inadequate equipment and personnel training degrade the reliability of individuals to provide safe care in an emergency. This article discusses inconsistent preparedness throughout commercial aviation to support care during an in-flight medical situation; it suggests federal oversight of medical kits may help to ensure their completeness and improve the potential for safety should care be required.

Request for Information: Creating a National Healthcare System Action Alliance to Advance Patient Safety.

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Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. Fed Register. December 12, 2022;87:76046-76048.

Partnerships are needed to motivate, design, and implement lasting innovation in complex situations. This announcement calls for stakeholder insights on the work of the National Healthcare System Action Alliance to Advance Patient Safety and how it can best realize its mission and goals. The deadline for submitting comments is January 26, 2023.

From heart disease to IUDs: how doctors dismiss women’s pain.

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Bever L. Washington Post. December 13, 2022.

Gender and racial bias contributes to inadequate and delayed care. This story focuses on women who have experienced harm due to their pain concerns being marginalized or dismissed.

National Patient Safety Board Act of 2022.

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HR 9377, 117th Cong, 2d Sess (2022).

The need for a national government-led patient safety effort has long been advocated for. This legislation outlines the structure of a federal agency to provide support for patient safety data collection, national incident analysis, and recommendation development.

Rise to Health Coalition.

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Boston, MA; Institute for Healthcare Improvement: December 2022.

Systemic efforts to improve health equity support patient safety. This announcement highlights an initiative for collective work to address four areas of effort to reduce inequity in health care: access, workforce, social and structural drivers, and quality and safety.

Cybersecurity is Patient Safety: Policy Options in the Health Care Sector.

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Washington DC; Office of Senator Mark Warner: November 25, 2022.

There is lack of consensus concerning the need for increased system and policy attention on cybersecurity challenges as a threat to patient safety. The report suggests modifications within the federal government infrastructure to increase attention to cybersecurity as a safety issue, public/private partnership opportunities, and policy development to reduce the potential for cyberattacks that impact care delivery.

Press Play on Safety Conversations.

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Healthcare Excellence Canada. 2022.

After a patient safety incident, effective discussions are critical for healing and improvement. This website houses collections of materials to support constructive communication should a failure or near-miss occur. There are two distinct sections of materials: one for established healthcare professionals, and another for patients, students, and caregivers.

Her child was stillborn at 39 weeks. She blames a system that doesn’t always listen to mothers.

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Eldeib D. ProPublica. November 13, 2022.

Pregnancy is recognized as a high-risk condition for both mother and infant. This news story examines the potential for stillbirth and its preventability. Lack of respect for the concerns of mothers, inadequate attention to research, and poor patient education are discussed as contributors to stillbirth.

How to Stay Safe When Entering the Healthcare System: A Physician Walks across the Country to Raise Awareness of the Need to Improve Healthcare Safety.

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Meyer DB. Boca Raton, FL: Universal Publishers; 2022. ISBN:‎ 9781627344067

Individual commitment to patient safety can motivate change. This book highlights an advocacy action by a patient safety leader to generate awareness, engagement, and action using personal, professional, and patient stories of error.

Deep Dive: Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Health and Healthcare.

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Plymouth Meeting, PA: ECRI and the Institute for Safe Medication Practices; 2022.

Racist behavior directed at either patients or clinicians can degrade the safety of care. This report reviewed over 500 race- or ethnicity-related patient safety incidents to determine the types of actions involved and the role of the individual committing the action. In addition, the impact of the behaviors on the mental health of providers is examined. The report suggests strategies for understanding, detecting, and reducing health disparities.

Evaluation of Quality, Safety and Value in Veterans Health Administration Facilities, Fiscal 2021.

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Washington, DC: Veterans Affairs Office of Inspector General; 2022. Report No. 22-00818-03.

Organizational evaluations often reveal opportunities to address persistent quality and safety issues. This extensive inspection report shares findings from examinations at 45 Veterans Health Administration care facilities that focused on assessing oversight, system redesign and surgical programs. Recommendations drawn from the analysis call for improvements in protected peer review, surgical work structure and surgical adverse incident examination.

Pulse oximeters and their inaccuracies will get FDA scrutiny today. What took so long?

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McFarling UL. STAT. November 1, 2022.

Evidence is building to delineate the effect of systemic bias on care safety. This article recognizes the flaws of pulse oximeters on patients with darker skin, gaps in the literature base, and the work of regulatory bodies to consider redesign and regulation of the device to address bias.

Walgreens will stop judging its pharmacy staffers by how fast they work.

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Kaplan A. NBC News. October 27, 2022.

Suboptimal working conditions are a known contributor to errors in retail pharmacies. This news article discusses how one major pharmacy chain will adjust their staff quality metrics to eliminate timing as a performance measure in the interest of reducing pharmacist and staff burnout and fulfilment errors.

Medicare fines for high hospital readmissions drop, but nearly 2,300 facilities are still penalized.

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Rau J. Kaiser Health News. November 1, 2022.

The COVID-19 pandemic necessitated adjustments in activities across health care to address patient care and staffing demands. This news article discusses COVID-19’s impact on the hospital-acquired condition reduction program, and how 43 percent of US hospitals failed to reach readmission goals.

The National Healthcare System Action Alliance to Advance Patient Safety.

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US Department of Health and Human Services.

The large system change required to reduce patient harm requires multi-stakeholder engagement and sustained commitment. This alliance will work with healthcare systems, federal partners, patients and families, and other stakeholders to implement a national plan to ensure the safety of patients and healthcare workers. The webinar introducing the program, featuring Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra, was held November 14, 2022.

Position Statement on Criminalization of Medical Error and Call for Action to Prevent Patient Harm from Error.

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Cooper J, Thomas BJ, Rebello E, et al for the APSF Criminalization of Error Task Force. APSF Newsletter. October 2022; 37(3):80-81

Criminalizing human error can deter the transparency necessary to learn from incidents and improve health care. This position statement articulates the importance of avoiding the criminal prosecution to mistakes to instead focus on system failures to prevent conditions that permit errors to harm patients.

Comprehensive Healthcare Inspection Summary Report: Evaluation of Care Coordination in Veterans Health Administration Facilities, Fiscal Year 2021.

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Washington, DC: VA Office of the Inspector General; September 15, 2022. Report no. 22-00815-232.

Care coordination failures reduce the effectiveness of communication, information transfer, and patient monitoring to the determent of safety. This report examines the current state of interfacility transfers in 45 veteran facilities to find that, while process requirements were basically met, improvements could be made to medication list transfer, nursing communication, and general service evaluation.

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