Background: Cross-cover is defined as caring for hospitalized patients for whom one is not the primary provider. This is a common, daily practice for residents and hospitalists. It has been demonstrated that the primary intern for a patient is available for only 39% of a patient’s hospital stay. Despite this, no guidelines currently exist regarding [...]

Background: Interhospital transfer is a poorly understood transition of care that is associated with increased length of stay and mortality. The processes and communication between transferring and accepting facilities and providers are not standardized. Purpose: Hospitalist faculty education on triage processes is an area for potential intervention to improve interhospital transfer. New faculty hires are [...]

Background: Hospital discharge is a vulnerable time: patients are at risk for readmission, adverse events, and death. Activated patients–those with the knowledge, confidence, and skills to engage in activities that promote self-management–are more likely to execute a safe discharge plan and less likely to be readmitted. Educational videos focused on self-management may increase patient activation [...]

Background: Over the past 50 years, observation status patients have been cared for in a variety of settings: in the emergency department, on inpatient floors, and in dedicated observation units. At our medical center, inpatient teams have traditionally cared for observation patients on medical wards. Patients were often unaware of their admission status until they [...]

Background: The use of maintenance fluids (MF, continuous intravenous fluid (IVF)) to prevent dehydration is common, yet highly variable in practice. Unnecessary MF can cause patient harm including fluid overload, sleep disruption (associated alarms), and increase falls risks. In 2017, Hurricane Maria destroyed Puerto Rican facilities that were critical in producing IVF, exacerbating an existing [...]

Background: Regardless of specialty or discipline, healthcare professionals are tasked with addressing high value care (HVC). It is therefore crucial that hospitalists and other members of the interprofessional team have training in addressing HVC, specifically around education and incorporating HVC into clinical practice and health systems improvement activities. Purpose: We developed a longitudinal curriculum at [...]