4 Stories You Need But May Have Missed This Week

We know you’re busy, but we don’t want you to miss important healthcare quality and patient safety news. Below is a roundup of stories you may have missed but need to take a look at before calling it a week. (Sign up on the right if you’d like these news alerts delivered to you.)

1. It’s Judgment Day for Hospital Websites Exactly how transparent is your facility’s website? This week, The Leapfrog Group and UARC issued a call for entries for their Hospital Website Transparency Awards designed to encourage hospitals to publicly share, via the internet, quality measure information as well as present a more true-to-life depiction of their service offerings.
2. In Florida, Cutting Readmissions by 15% Saved Hospitals $25M Access Florida Hospital Association’s report, Five Years of Quality: Working Together to Improve Care, and find out what steps their hospitals have taken toward establishing a national model for addressing readmissions, surgical complications and life-threatening infections all while avoiding millions of dollars in healthcare costs.
3. More Hospitals Use Social Media to Gather Feedback from Patients’ Families  Now that patient satisfaction scores have begun to impact hospital payments, providers have started getting more creative when it comes to finding out what they need to do to improve patient and family experience.  Learn how e-advisers, electronic surveys and social media networks are changing the way patient voices are being heard while honoring their need for convenience and privacy.
4. New Resource Presents 5-Step Process for Engaging Patients Download the American Hospital Association’s just-released guide, A Leadership Resource for Patient and Family Engagement Strategies, designed to help hospitals improve engagement with patients and their families.