Many states protect medical staff peer review information from discovery, meaning that a plaintiff's attorney cannot use it against individuals who participate in peer review. The purpose of the protection is to allow medical staffs to discuss peer review issues candidly and...
Starting with the next edition of The Joint Commission's Comprehensive Accreditation Manual for Hospitals to be published this spring, The Joint Commission will change the term "disruptive behavior" to "behaviors that undermine a culture of safety." The accrediting agency...
In an effort to improve the accuracy of the data contained within the National Practitioner Data Bank (NPDB) and the Healthcare Integrity and Protection Data Bank (HIPDB), the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) has...
The National Practitioner Data Bank (NPDB) is taking a stand to protect the identities of healthcare organizations, physicians, and other healthcare practitioners. In September 2011, the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) shut down its public-use data file after...
Understanding which medical staff members are eligible to serve as medical staff leaders can be challenging, particularly in markets in which hospitals compete aggressively with each other for patients and resources. On HCPro's e-mail talk group "Medical Staff Talk," one...
The Health Care Quality Improvement Act of 1986 (HCQIA) was created to provide immunity from monetary damages to hospitals and individual practitioners participating on medical peer review committees. HCQIA also created the National Practitioner Data Bank.
