A Great Catch

The Department of Radiology would like to recognize several of our Caregivers who recently found incidences of potential patient misidentification before there was a negative impact on patient care.  By being diligent in the Patient Identification and Verification process they prevented the patients from receiving the wrong examination and/or medication administration. We acknowledge the following technologists:

Kraig Thebado
Blake Brush
Ed Murray
Carmen Yursha
Michelle Watson

The Joint Commission reaffirms that “wrong-patient errors occur in virtually all stages of diagnosis and treatment,” which is why Patient Identification is consistently placed on the group’s annual Patient Safety Goals. Errors in Patient Identification frequently involve multiple departments and can easily go unnoticed. Prevention requires diligence and effort from all Caregivers involved in patient care.

Over the past year the Radiology Department has been re-affirmed our priority to create a Culture of Safety throughout the department. As part of this program, departmental senior leadership developed a Patient ID Workgroup to identify the root causes of patient misidentification. This workgroup is composed of Caregivers representing each role in the Radiology Care Team. The team has been developing new workflows and implementing technology to identify and reduce these potential errors. Adhering to existing and newly implemented workflows provided the opportunity for these Caregivers to catch these cases before any radiation or medication had been administered to the patient (near miss).

These near miss events demonstrate how the actions of a single caregiver can have a significant, beneficial impact on the quality and safety of care for our patients in Radiology. 

We celebrate these individuals for a job well done!

Apologies for missing photos of Blake Brush and Ed Murray.