Background: Academic medical procedure services (MPS) arise from the continued need for procedural training in the setting of decreasing procedural opportunities, increasing safety awareness, and increasing demands on inpatient resident time. Prior research has shown that MPS can improve resident confidence, subjective patient and resident experience, and resident supervision. Little is known about the procedural [...]

Background: Despite the wide use of warfarin therapy this drug is associated with the largest number of serious adverse event reports by the FDA with 86% of warfarin-associated bleeds resulting in serious outcomes, and 10% in fatal outcomes.  The American College of Chest Physicians Evidence-Based Clinical Practice Guidelines recommend rapid reversal with 4-factor prothrombin complex [...]

Background: A recent nationwide recall for large glass evacuated containers has led to new innovations performing large volume paracentesis (LVP). Compared to the individually manufactured evacuated containers traditionally used in the past, wall suction systems are relatively inexpensive and readily available on most inpatient floors. The ease of access and cost savings makes a wall [...]

Background: A 42 year old male with know stage IV rhabdomyosarcoma of the neck presented to the ED from subacute rehab with severe dyspnea.  He had already undergone chemotherapy and radiation therapy, and had planned for home hospice after discharge from subacute rehab.  He had previously signed a DNR/DNI, but rescinded, and was intubated.  CT [...]

Background: Developing effective tools which enhance patient-physician communication is crucial to improving the patient experience. Existing research has shown that there are several components which are central to effective communication, including creating a good interpersonal relationship, facilitating exchange of information, and including patients in decision making. Based on our experience at an underserved community hospital [...]

Background: Senior residents often serve as the primary educator for medical students and interns on their inpatient medicine rotations. Additionally, the act of teaching enhances the resident’s own knowledge acquisition and retention. Although residents desire to teach more, insufficient time is a barrier to preparing and providing teaching. Thus, senior residents require adequate resources to [...]

Background: At the University of Colorado, we developed the ‘Health Innovations Scholars Program’ (HISP), a 5-week intensive training program for pre-clinical medical students who seek to lead innovative transformation of the healthcare system. The program focuses on quality improvement, patient safety, leadership skills, design-thinking, and change management delivered through didactic sessions and applied to an [...]

Background: Post-hospitalization follow-up is an important phase of care transitions.  However, it continues to be a challenge for patients to keep office visit appointments made at the time of discharge, particularly if the visit is with a primary care physician that is new to the patient.  Directly involving patients in the appointment scheduling process may [...]

Background: Structured, interdisciplinary plan of care (IPOC) rounds appear to augment coordination of care and communication among health care workers and may offer additional benefits to patients, their families, and providers in the inpatient setting. However implementation of IPOC rounds in a large, busy tertiary center with a high acuity of illness is challenging. Purpose: [...]

Background: Every year, as many as 98,000 people die from medical errors within the hospital, making medical errors one of the top 10 leading causes of death in the United States(1). While the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) has incorporated healthcare quality and patient safety into the Clinical Learning Environment Review (CLER) program [...]