Background: The field of hospital medicine has grown significantly, warranting investigation of staffing models to maximize outcomes and promote patient safety. Handoffs are a source of increased risk for patients and result in longer lengths of stay, increases in error, and missed items for follow up. Our current hospital medicine model uses specialized care teams […]

Background: Transitions of care from one service to another are a precarious time with risk of adverse events, medical errors, and clinician dissatisfaction. Every handoff involves transferring information and responsibility for a patient from one physician to another. The appropriateness of transfer is critical to safe patient care. The transfer process from an intensive care […]

Background: Communication errors in the post-operative period have been shown to contribute to patient harm and excess costs. There are no existing standards for the verbal handoff of post-operative patients to the acute care inpatient unit. There is limited literature describing hospitalist and surgeon experiences of and preferences for such handoffs. Our aim was to […]