Journal of hospital medicine : an official publication of the Society of Hospital Medicine
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Despite three decades of effort, ensuring inpatient safety remains elusive. Patients and family members are a potential source of safety observations, but systems gathering these are limited. Our goal was to test a system to gather safety observations from hospitalized patients and their family members via a real-time mobile health tool. ⋯ We demonstrated the feasibility of real-time patient and family-member technology-enabled safety observation reporting and elicited reports not otherwise identified. Variation in reporting may potentially exacerbate disparities in safety if not addressed.
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Observational Study
Associations between hospitalist physician workload, length of stay, and return to the hospital.
Hospitalist physicians' workload-the total number of patients they care for daily-is rising in the U.S. Hospitalists report that increased workload negatively affects patients care. ⋯ There was a statistically significant but modest relationship between workload and LOS; workload was not associated with ED visits or readmissions.Given clinical reports of the deleterious effects of increased hospitalist workload, there is a need for prospective research assessing a range of outcomes, beyond those measurable in contemporary EHR data.
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As opioid-related hospitalizations rise, hospitals must be prepared to evaluate and treat patients with opioid use disorder (OUD). We implemented a hospitalist-led program, Project Caring for patients with Opioid Misuse through Evidence-based Treatment (COMET) to address gaps in care for hospitalized patients with OUD. ⋯ Our program is one of the first to demonstrate successful implementation of a hospitalist-led, comprehensive approach to caring for hospitalized patients with OUD and can serve as an example to other institutions seeking to implement life-saving, evidence-based treatment in this population.