The Crossroads between Workforce and Education.

Concern is growing among industry leaders that students may not be obtaining the necessary skills for entry into the labor market. To gain an understanding of the perceived disconnect in the skill set of graduates entering the health information workforce, a survey was developed to examine the opinions of educators and employers related to graduate preparedness. The concern related to graduate preparedness is supported by findings in this research study, in which those working in industry and those in academia noted a disconnect between academic training and preparedness to enter the labor market.

Healthcare fraud and abuse.

In Texas, a supplier of durable medical equipment was found guilty of five counts of healthcare fraud due to submission of false claims to Medicare. The court sentenced the supplier to 120 months of incarceration and restitution of $1.6 million.

Improving patient safety through information technology.

Health information technology (HIT) is generally accepted as the solution for the nation's medical error crisis. Although limited studies suggest the importance of using HIT in the process of medication management, research has failed to adequately describe how HIT actually works in capturing medication error data and improving patient safety within a healthcare system.1-3 The aim of our study is to identify essential elements in the adoption of technology within the broader context of system change and workflow modification.

Identifying barriers to the adoption of new technology in rural hospitals: a case report.

The purpose of this study is to identify barriers to the adoption of new technology in rural settings. Specifically, this paper focuses on identifying and overcoming barriers to the adoption of a medication error reporting system in eight rural hospitals. Prior research has generally focused on barriers to the adoption of new technology in urban areas, medical centers, or large hospitals.

The pharmacist-physician relationship in the detection of ambulatory medication errors.

Background: Expenditures on outpatient prescription drugs have increased enormously in the last decade. Despite this growth in expenditures, prescription medication safety in the ambulatory setting is lacking. Prior research in outpatient care has centered around the physician-patient encounter.

Fixing broken bones and broken homes: domestic violence as a patient safety issue.

Background: Domestic violence (DV) is a significant problem in terms of both patient harm and cost. To better address this problem, the diagnosis and treatment of DV are considered within the emerging model of patient safety and medical error reduction. The case of a female patient who presents in the clinical setting following an incident of DV shows how medical errors can be analyzed as they are in medical cases not involving DV, such as when a person with abdominal pain is sent away from the emergency department with instructions to take an acid reducer and later suffers a burst appendix.