At-Home Cardiac Rehabilitation Just as Effective as Center-Based Programs

Reimbursement Enacted during Pandemic Set to Expire At-home or hybrid cardiac rehabilitation (CR) programs are safe and work as well as or better than center-based programs for reducing risk and im...

Palliative Care Access for Indigenous Populations: Removing Barriers and Reducing Disparities

Palliative care is a type of specialized medical care for patients living with terminal medical conditions. The goal of palliative care is to alleviate patients’ suffering and to improve their qual...

Balancing Disinfection and Manufacturer Recommendations in Ultrasound Technologies

Introduction As the use of ultrasound technology continues to expand across various medical disciplines—from radiology and cardiology to point-of-care applications—ensuring appropriate and effectiv...

Drug Diversion and Infection Prevention: When the Needle Hits the Vein

Longtime infection prevention leaders likely remember the story of David Kwiatkowski—a healthcare worker whose drug diversion activities put thousands of patients at risk of hepatitis C infection. ...

Supporting Nurses in Transition: Addressing Patient Safety Concerns in 2024

For 2024, one of the most pressing concerns in healthcare is ensuring the safe and effective transition of new nurses from their education into clinical practice. As the frontline of patient care, ...

Understanding “Human Factors” is Not “Factors Associated with Being Human”

Modern healthcare relies on a variety of physical and digital assets and tools. Sophisticated medical devices help in diagnosing and treating disease. Advanced materials prevent the spread of bacte...

Advancing Safe and Equitable Healthcare: The New Patient Safety Structural Measure by CMS

On July 31, 2024, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) announced a significant update to the hospital quality reporting program with the finalization of the Patient Safety Structu...

Five Key Takeaways on Video-Based Patient Monitoring for Preventing Falls

ECRI named ongoing challenges related to patient falls as one of its 2024 Top 10 Patient Safety Concerns because falls continue to be the number one sentinel event reported to the Joint Commission ...

Navigating the Complexities of Dementia Diagnosis: The Path to Diagnostic Excellence

Understanding the diagnosis of dementia is essential for medical professionals, patients, and caregivers. Unlike many medical conditions that are diagnosed through straightforward testing, diagnosi...

How American Emergency Departments Are Missing Older Adult Abuse

A recent report in the Journal of the American Geriatric Society (JAGS) suggests that emergency departments (EDs) have opportunities to improve how they identify cases of older adult abuse and how ...

Introducing SALUTE: Ensuring Equitable Healthcare for Veterans

Designing a healthcare delivery system that ensures equitable care for all patients is crucial for achieving total systems safety. This includes building partnerships among patients, families, and ...

What Hospitals Need to Know: Using Water During Processing of Medical Devices

Every day, hospitals’ central sterile processing teams rely on water as they clean and sterilize a variety of medical devices. In this blog, ECRI outlines general considerations to support safe and...

Using Evidence to Facilitate Physician-Patient Conversations about GLP-1 RAs

Glucagon-like peptide receptor agonists (GLP-1 RAs) now available to promote weight loss—Wegovy (semaglutide), Zepbound (tirzepatide), and Saxenda (liraglutide)—could potentially make much needed g...

ECRI’s Top 10 Patient Safety Concerns for 2024

ECRI recently published our Top 10 Patient Safety Concerns for 2024 Special Report—the annual guide that calls attention to pressing patient safety concerns facing the healthcare industry. For thi...

IWD 2024: How to Continue Progress in Cervical Cancer Screening

International Women’s Day is an opportune time to celebrate improvements in women’s health outcomes—and reflect on steps we can take to achieve even more progress. For this blog, we’re focusing on ...

Monitoring Patients Who Take GLP-1 RAs for Weight Loss – What Prescribers Should Know

Roughly one year after their introduction, Wegovy (semaglutide) and Zepbound (tirzepatide) continue to shake up the obesity treatment landscape in the United States. Uptake for these two glucagon-l...

Weighing the Evidence on New Weight Loss Drugs – Five Takeaways

The prevalence of overweight and obesity keeps worsening in America despite our enormous collective effort to lose weight. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that overwei...

15 Years as a PSO. Decades Improving Safety.

This year, ECRI and the Institute for Safe Medication Practices PSO celebrates our 15th anniversary as an AHRQ-listed Patient Safety Organization. Over this decade and a half, we have worked tirele...

The Insidious Dangers of Disposable Isolation Gowns—and How to Address Them

Isolation gowns are a longstanding infection control tool across hospital settings. These garments are intended to safeguard patients and clinicians by preventing the spread of disease-causing micr...

Exploring Oral Hygiene’s Role in Reducing Ventilator-Associated Pneumonia

Ventilator-associated pneumonia (VAP) is a lung infection that develops 48 hours or more after initiating invasive mechanical ventilation. Mechanical ventilation assists breathing in patients who h...

Legal Perspective: Employee’s Alleged Use of Soiled Scissors Results in Real Harm

A home care client suffered infection and leg amputation after an employee allegedly trimmed dead skin off the client's foot with rusty scissors that had been used to cut off a soiled diaper. In a ...