Editor's Note The Food and Drug Administration announced that new data elements will be available on AccessGUDID, in the download files and in the APIs, as of April 2. Data for FDA Premarket Submission Number and FDA Premarket Supplement Number will not be provided until this summer. The FDA is…

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Editor's Note The poor design of electronic health records (EHRs) poses challenges for primary care practices to generate the required reports for federal value-based payment programs, this study finds. An analysis of survey responses from 1,492 practices in 12 states, found that the reports generated for meaningful-use participation, which requires…

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Editor's Note Patients at Porter Adventist Hospital in Denver may be at risk for HIV or hepatitis after the hospital discovered a surgical instrument sterilization breach, the April 5 LiveScience reports. The process for precleaning surgical instruments was found to be inadequate, which may have put patients who had orthopedic…

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Editor's Note The Joint Commission announced on April 4 that it is no longer scoring two elements of performance (EPs), effective March 9, that were removed from the Medication Compounding chapter in the Home Care Accreditation program standards manual and the Compounding Sterile and Nonsterile Preparations chapter in the Medication…

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Editor's Note Black and white disparities in hospital readmission rates narrowed after the introduction of Medicare’s Hospital Readmission Reduction Program that penalizes higher than expected readmissions; however, black and white gaps still persist and minority serving hospitals continued to be penalized more by the program, this study finds. During the…

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Editor's Note At First Hill Surgery Center in Seattle, patients can have a knee or hip replaced in the morning and go home in the afternoon, the April Seattle Magazine reports. The surgical procedure takes about 2 hours, and patients admitted at 7:30 am generally are able to return home…

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Editor's Note Anterior cervical discectomy and fusion (ACDF) can be performed on an outpatient basis with comparable morbidity, readmission rates, and lower costs as on an inpatient basis, finds this study. In this analysis of 3,135 outpatient and 46,966 inpatient ACDFs, the mean Charlson comorbidity index, length of stay, and…

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Editor's Note Blue Cross Blue Shield (BCBS) of Michigan is piloting a bundled payment program for hip and knee replacements, the March 27 HealthcareDive reports. The pilot, which includes 64 surgeons at seven healthcare systems, will use a mix of inpatient and outpatient settings in an effort to reduce the…

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Editor's Note Increased revenues had a greater impact than decreased costs in hospitals that became more profitable between 2003 and 2013, finds this Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) study published February 14 online ahead of print in the Journal of General Internal Medicine. In this analysis of 2,824…

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Editor's note The ECRI Institute on April 2 issued a free white paper on “5 Ways to Drive Savings and Quality on Your Purchased Services.” The 5 key areas to consider when developing a best practice process to evaluate purchased services, reduce spending, and make informed vendor selections are: Making…

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