WHAT'S THIS?

An 83-year-old man with a history of COPD, gastroesophageal reflux disease, and paroxysmal atrial fibrillation with sick sinus syndrome was admitted to the cardiology service of a teaching hospital for initiation of an antiarrhythmic medication and placement of a permanent pacemaker 

He had surgery earlier today, and he's on a PCA pump right now.

Even if x-rays were free and patients and staff were willing to put up with the procedure and additional radiation exposure, keeping anesthetized surgical patients on the table any longer than strictly necessary is not without its own risks.

The standard protocol requires four separate counts: when the instruments are set up and the sponges are unpacked, when the surgery begins and the items are called for and used, at the time of closure, and during external suturing.

Just as in clinical medicine, promising safety strategies sometimes can turn out to confer no benefit or even create new problems—hence the need for rigorous evaluations of candidate patient safety strategies just as in other areas of medicine.

One of the best-studied examples is that of laparoscopic cholecystectomy, a technique that essentially replaced the more dangerous and costly open cholecystectomy in the early 1990s

He filled a report in the patient's record.

Conferences to discuss errors, medical errors have long been considered an inevitable by-product of modern medicine or the unfortunate detritus of bad providers.

Inadvertent administration of full-strength phenylephrine can cause a stroke.

Approximately I in 30 "clean" surgeries (surgeries characterized by an uninfected wound).