Infection Control Today Magazine

Checklists

Checklist Program Reduces Infections, Saves Lives and Money

A quality improvement program that saves lives by dramatically reducing potentially lethal bloodstream infections in hospital intensive-care units across the state of Michigan also saves those hospitals an average of $1.1 million a year, new Johns Hopkins research suggests. ...More
August 22, 2011
Posted in News, Infections & Pathogens
Checklists Can Help Physicians Care for Critically Ill

Caring for patients in a medical intensive care unit in a hospital and flying a 747 are complicated tasks that require tracking thousands of important details, some of which could get overlooked. That's why the pilot has a checklist and a copilot to make sure nothing slips ...More
June 22, 2011
Posted in News
Patient Checklist Legislation Passes Nevada Senate, Heads to Governor

In late May, the Nevada Senate passed A.B. 280, legislation sponsored by Speaker of the Assembly John Oceguera, implementing a patient checklist at medical facilities. "Requiring medical facilities to adopt patient checklists is something more and more states are doing ...More
June 2, 2011
Posted in News
Checklists, Culture of Accountability are Reinvigorating the Patient Safety Movement

The use of a medical or surgical checklist is now a familiar activity for many healthcare professionals, but experts are asking if they are impacting patient outcomes and contributing to patient safety in a meaningful way. And now, the data from a new study are indicating ...More
April 18, 2011
Posted in Articles
Communication Breakdowns Undercut the Effectiveness of Safety Tools, Impact Patient Outcomes

Healthcare professionals make calculated decisions daily to not alert their colleagues when a safety tool signals potential harm to a patient, according to a new study of 6,500 nurses and nurse managers released March 22 during a national briefing in at AORN Congress being ...More
March 22, 2011
Posted in News
Checklist Cuts Lethal Ventilator-Associated Lung Infections

Cases of ventilator-associated pneumonia (VAP) — the most lethal and among the most common of all hospital-associated infections — dropped by more than 70 percent in Michigan hospitals where medical staff used a simple checklist designed by Johns Hopkins researchers. Such ...More
February 17, 2011
Posted in News
Handwashing Query as Part of Checklist Drives Compliance

Internal Medicine News is reporting on an intervention described in a poster session by Dr. Jeremy Pamplin of Brooke Army Medical Center in Fort Sam Houston, Texas, presented at the Annual Congress of the Society for Critical Care Medicine. Reporter Doug Brunk reports that ...More
February 4, 2011
Posted in News, Hand Hygiene
Safety Checklist Use Yields 10 Percent Drop in Hospital Deaths

A Johns Hopkins-led safety checklist program that virtually eliminated bloodstream infections in hospital intensive-care units throughout Michigan appears to have also reduced deaths by 10 percent, a new study suggests. Although prior research showed a major reduction in ...More
January 31, 2011
Posted in News
Quality Improvement Intervention for ICUs Results in Increased Use of Evidence-Based Care Practices

A multi-faceted quality improvement intervention that included education, reminders and feedback through a collaborative telecommunication network improved the adoption of evidence-based care practices in intensive care units at community hospitals for practices such as ...More
January 20, 2011
Posted in News
Peter Pronovost to Join the Board of Directors of Cantel Medical Corp.

Cantel Medical Corp. today announced the election of Peter J. Pronovost, MD, PhD, to serve as an independent member of Cantel's board of directors. "Dr. Pronovost is a world-renowned leader of patient safety and quality, serving as a practicing anesthesiologist and critical ...More
January 13, 2011
Posted in News