Author Archive for Steve MacArthur
Steve MacArthur is a consultant for The Greeley Company, a division of HCPro. He brings 30 years of healthcare management and consulting experience to his work with hospitals, physician offices, and ambulatory care facilities across the country. He is the author of HCPro's Hospital Safety Director's Handbook and is contributing editor for Briefings on Hospital Safety. Contact Steve at smacarthur@greeley.com.
You may be able to roll a monthly generator test into the triennial four-hour run
Some hospitals do not have enough power tied into the generators to make 30% of nameplate on a monthly basis as required by The Joint Commission under environment of care standard EC.02.05.07, element of performance (EP) 4.
In the interest of making very sure that [more]
With OR humidity, follow CMS and risk assessment findings
There is a great deal of not-quite-controversy relative to humidity concerns in operating rooms (OR) because of the personal comfort aspect.
The American Institute of Architects’ 2001 Guidelines for Design and Construction of Hospital and Healthcare Facilities indicate a temperature range [more]
Using your Swiss Army knife on protected health information
Recently on our chat group, Patient Safety Talk, someone raised a question about how to properly dispose of medication bottles that had patient information on them in terms of HIPAA compliance.
My best advice would be to [more]
Don’t sacrifice patient comfort for drill realism
I was discussing emergency management scenarios involving a bomb threat and whether such exercises needed to include the movement of actual patients. [more]
Digging into why LS.02.01.20 tops the most cited standards list
I was talking to one of the writers for our Briefings on Hospital Safety newsletter and the question came up about The Joint Commission’s recently released top cited standards.
The frequently cited standards are pretty much a numbers game and a continuation of [more]
Be wary about using fire drills as emergency management tests
I was recently asked whether fire drills could count towards The Joint Commission’s requirements for emergency management tests under EM.03.01.03.
I suppose if you evaluated a fire drill to the extent called for under [more]
OSHA raises the stakes in the N95 respirator debate
The October 20 edition of our free sister e-newsletter, OSHA Healthcare Connection, has generated a fair amount of what I like to think of as consternation.
At this point, I think most folks are familiar with the CDC coming down squarely on the side of N95 respirators versus surgical masks for use as personal protective equipment during our little H1N1 event.
I’ve heard from some folks [more]
Further thoughts on patient-owned equipment in the hospital
A quick follow-up to a post I made last week about patient-owned equipment coming into the hospital:
One thing you might want to consider relative to these types of devices is whether [more]
Joint Commission offers guidance, but no mandates, for patient-owned items
Many of you deal with patient-owned equipment, such as hair dryers, coming into the hospital.
The Joint Commission published an FAQ on this topic last year, and this is one of those instances in which, in opening the risk assessment door, the FAQ provides just enough semi-specific information to confuse matters. [more]
How leadership interacts with egress corridor storage
In my experience, I’m not sure that I could tie leadership directly to the problem of wheeled items parked in egress corridors.
However, it would certainly not be a stretch for a citation under [more]
