As a valued Relias Media subscriber, you can find the latest issue of your publication online. The articles below provide timely strategies and research for healthcare providers:
There are certain things nurses and physicians should never say to a patient or family member because they can lead to an increased risk of liability and dissatisfaction. Risk managers should educate clinicians about these comments to avoid.
The peer review process can lead to litigation when physicians challenge the validity of disciplinary hearings or are denied privileges. Strict adherence to good processes can reduce the risks.
The opioid crisis continues to create increased liability risks for healthcare providers, who must contend with more scrutiny over prescribing and management practices. A review of closed claims indicates hospitals and physicians can improve the way they follow guidelines and processes designed to reduce the risk.
The Patient Safety and Quality Improvement Act of 2005 affords substantial protections from discovery for information related to adverse events. Hospital leaders and clinicians often do not fully understand how to use these protections.
Thorough charting on the history and physical of an ED patient can prove the standard of care was met. Still, the medical record often contains little more than a series of checkboxes.
This case raises a few lessons for physicians and care providers: whether the physicians failed to preserve and test either cord blood gases or the placenta, whether the physicians breached the applicable standard of care regarding the use of labor-inducing drugs and failing to monitor the fetus prior to delivery, and whether the physicians failed to ensure employees were aware of and complied with the hospital’s policies and procedures.
Although the facts of the case seem to indicate the physician acted within the accepted standard of care, the outcome may have been different had the patient selected a more experienced, better-suited expert and presented his claim with more specificity.
Financial Disclosure: Author Greg Freeman, Editor Jill Drachenberg, Editor Jonathan Springston, Editorial Group Manager Leslie Coplin, Accreditations Manager Amy Johnson, MSN, RN, CPN, and Nurse Planner Maureen Archambault report no consultant, stockholder, speaker’s bureau, research, or other financial relationships with companies having ties to this field of study. Consulting Editor Arnold Mackles, MD, MBA, LHRM, discloses that he is an author and advisory board member for The Sullivan Group and that he is owner, stockholder, presenter, author, and consultant for Innovative Healthcare Compliance Group.
