Each year, nonprofit ECRI creates a list of the industry’s top ten patient safety concerns. This year, the pediatric mental health crisis topped the list, above other important issues like violence against healthcare staff and clinicians being expected to work outside their scope of practice.
In 2022, the healthcare sector is on track to meet or exceed the more than 50.4 million patient records that were breached last year. As we look ahead to 2023, increasing cybersecurity budgets will be a necessity for healthcare organizations, despite their tight financial circumstances.
ECRI recently issued an alert warning hospitals about the cybersecurity risks associated with the use of third-party analytics tools, such as Meta Pixel, Google Analytics and Adobe Analytics. When providers install these tools on their websites and patient portals, they may be exposing patient data — which tech companies can use to target medical-related ads to consumers as they browse the Internet.
Misuse of surgical staplers led the ECRI Institute's Top 10 Technology Hazards report for 2020. Earlier this year, the FDA revealed 11,181 serious injuries related to stapler incidents had been reported in the last decade.
A report from ECRI Institute outlined the 10 biggest patient safety concerns, and diagnostic errors and improper management of test results in EHRs topped the list.
The door has closed on guideline.gov, which provided physicians and others with information on best medical practices, but ECRI Institute said it will maintain a version of the resource.
A specialty drug is a class of prescription medications used to treat complex, chronic or rare medical conditions. Although this classification was originally intended to define the treatment of rare, also termed “orphan” diseases, affecting fewer than 200,000 people in the US, more recently, specialty drugs have emerged as the cornerstone of treatment for chronic and complex diseases such as cancer, autoimmune conditions, diabetes, hepatitis C, and HIV/AIDS.
The Partnership for Health IT Patient Safety has unveiled a report that highlights a three-pronged approach for how organizations can make health IT safety a part of their overall safety initiatives.
Topping this year's list is ransomware and other cybersecurity threats. Contaminated mattresses, improperly cleaned medical devices and flaws in medical device networking also made the cut.
Many hospitals have implemented hybrid operating rooms (typically an OR with a fixed C-arm angiographic system), and many more are considering it.
