What’s New in the Patient Safety World
December
2008 IOM Report on Resident Work
Hours
IOM Report on
Resident Work Hours
The Institute of Medicine (IOM) has released its new report
“Resident Duty Hours:
Enhancing Sleep, Supervision, and Safety” this month. Though the report
does not recommend further constriction of the current limit of 80 hours per
week for residents, it does include recommendations about further reducing
consecutive hours worked and inclusion of mandatory nap periods and mandatory
days off. Moreover, it recommends that much of the work that residents
currently peform (“scut” work) such as phlebotomy be done instead by other
healthcare workers. It also calls for better supervision of residents and
increased resident education in patient safety.
One important point
has to do with handoffs (see our September 30, 2008 Patient Safety Tip of the
Week “Hot Topic: Handoffs”
and see the article just below this one). With more restricted workhours, the
number of handoffs between residents has increased. The IOM report emphasizes
the need to make adequate time available for handoffs to occur.
http://www.iom.edu/CMS/3809/48553/60449.aspx
http://www.patientsafetysolutions.com
Patient
Safety Tip of the Week Archive
What’s New in the Patient Safety World Archive