Should compliance with the Surgical Care Improvement Project (SCIP) process measures determine Medicare and Medicaid reimbursement rates?

The Surgical Care Improvement Project (SCIP) is a project that focuses on improving surgical care by reducing surgical morbidity and mortality by 25 per cent by 2010. Starting in 2011, SCIP compliance affects Medicare and Medicaid reimbursement rates. Although SCIP reinforces better practices in surgical care, does compliance with SCIP measures actually result in a decrease in surgical morbidity and mortality? This study examined compliance with the SCIP surgical site infection (SSI) module (prophylactic antibiotic received within 1 hour before surgical incision) during 2009 to 2010 (n = 703) to determine whether patients compliant with SCIP data had a correlation with SSI rates as reported by National Surgery Quality Improvement Program (NSQIP) data for the same time period.

Teamwork training improves the clinical care of trauma patients.

Objectives: We investigated these questions: Does formal team training improve team behaviors in the trauma resuscitation bay? If yes, then does improved teamwork lead to more efficiency in the trauma bay and/or improved clinical outcomes?

Design: This intervention study used a pretraining/posttraining design. The intervention was TeamSTEPPS augmented by simulation. The evaluation instrument, which was the Trauma Team Performance Observation Tool (TPOT), was used by trained evaluators to assess teams' performance during trauma resuscitations.

Interferon receptor alpha/beta is associated with improved survival after adjuvant therapy in resected pancreatic cancer.

Aim: Interferons (IFNs) are known to have antiproliferative and immunoregulatory activities that are modulated through specific cell surface ligands, known as IFN-alpha, -beta, and -gamma receptors. The presence of these receptors and their impact on response to adjuvant therapy in patients with pancreatic cancer has not been determined.

Patients And Methods: Slides were prepared from 46 patients with pancreatic adenocarcinoma.

Expression of interferon receptors in pancreatic cancer: identification of a novel prognostic factor.

Objectives: Interferons (IFNs) are known to have antiproliferative and immunoregulatory activities that are modulated through specific cellular-surface ligands, known as IFN-alpha, -beta, and -gamma receptors. The presence of these receptors and their impact on survival in patients with pancreatic cancer has not been determined.

Methods: Slides were prepared from 46 patients with pancreatic adenocarcinoma.