Industry Standards

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Joint Commission works with SGS Group

OAKBROOK TERRACE, Ill.—The Joint Commission and SGS Group are joining forces to offer hospitals and critical access hospitals in the United States the option of pursuing both accreditation and certification to various ISO and industry best practice standards beginning in early 2012. This program combines The Joint Commission’s modern health care quality and safety standards, survey process, and accountability performance measures with SGS management system audits including certification to the ISO 9001 quality management system standards. The combination of accreditation and ISO offers hospitals the tools to maintain best practices and lower costs across their entire operation while remaining focused on their core service – delivering quality health care to patients.

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70% of dialysis programs performing as expected

WASHINGTON, D.C.—The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has released the first results for a pay-for-performance or “value-based purchasing” program for dialysis facilities that is designed to give facilities payment incentives to improve the quality of care furnished to patients diagnosed with End-stage Renal Disease (ESRD).  Nearly 70% of dialysis facilities that were evaluated under the program will receive no payment reduction in payment year (PY) 2012, while the remaining 30% will receive reductions ranging from 0.5% to 2.0% depending on their final performance scores.

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OSHA provides materials for lab managers

WASHINGTON, D.C.—The  U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has published educational materials for laboratory managers on protecting their workers from exposure to chemical, biological and physical hazards. The new materials include the Laboratory Safety Guidance document, which describes how electrical, fire, explosions and falls, among other hazards, can be minimized or eliminated if employers use safety plans, worker training, engineering controls and personal protective equipment. For more information, see www.osha.gov

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Associations form testing organization

CHICAGO—The Lab Advantage program is designed to be one-stop shopping for laboratories looking for accreditation, education, and proficiency testing products and services. Lab Advantage is a convergence of the American Society for Clinical Pathology’s (ASCP) education and assessment products, the American Proficiency Institute’s (API) proficiency testing and management services, and The Joint Commission’s accreditation of laboratory processes. For more information, see www.labadvantage.org.

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USGBC introduces green healthcare standards

PHOENIX—The U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) has introduced its latest green building rating system, LEED for Healthcare, at the CleanMed conference.

The rating system guides the design and construction of both new buildings and major renovations of existing buildings, and can be applied to inpatient, outpatient and licensed long-term care facilities, medical offices, assisted living facilities, and medical education and research centers.

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CMS issues proposed rule

WASHINGTON, D.C.-- The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) issued a proposed rule that would update payment policies and payment rates for services furnished to Medicare beneficiaries in hospital outpatient departments (HOPDs) and ambulatory surgical centers (ASCs) beginning Jan. 1, 2012. 

The proposed rule would continue to emphasize the importance of ensuring that beneficiaries receive high quality care without regard to the setting in which that care is provided.

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Standards address ambulatory care

CHICAGO--In an effort to reduce complexity and duplication and improve safety, the International Code Council (ICC) and the American Society for Healthcare Engineering (ASHE) of the American Hospital Association (AHA) are collaborating to develop a series of building code changes for hospital and ambulatory care facilities.

The joint effort, according to both organizations, aims to:

• Reduce conflicts caused by overlapping local and federal building and fire code requirements that can arise when constructing medical facilities;
• Ease the confusion between multiple authorities responsible for code enforcement of health care structures;
• Create comprehensive building and fire codes for the design and construction of new hospitals and ambulatory care facilities;
• Consistent code evaluation of existing health facilities;
• Increase the opportunity to apply science, research, modeling and historical data in the code development process; and
• Consider cost-effective construction alternatives which do not reduce current levels of safety.

For more information, see www.ashe.org

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Standard addresses care of hypodermic needles

WEST CONSHOHOCKEN, Penna.—Due to risk of infection from blood-borne pathogens such as human immunodeficiency virus and hepatitis C, hypodermic needle sticks pose a life-safety risk to healthcare professionals, law enforcement officials, sanitation workers, and others. An ASTM International standard addresses the mechanics of hypodermic needle puncture as related to protective clothing. ASTM F2878, Test Method for Protective Clothing Material Resistance to Hypodermic Needle Puncture, was developed by Subcommittee F23.20 on Physical, part of ASTM International Committee F23 on Personal Protective Clothing and Equipment. For more information, see www.astm.org

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Updated manual addresses labs

OAKBROOK TERRACE, Ill.—The Joint Commission “Comprehensive Accreditation Manual for Laboratory and Point- of-Care Testing (CAMLAB)” has been updated to provide clarity, additional specificity and detail to the standards and elements of performance. A preview of the new manual is posted on The Joint Commission website, and laboratories will be surveyed against the new manual beginning in July 2011.

The updated standards were designed to help accredited laboratories provide high-quality diagnostic services. The standards and related elements of performance provide clearer compliance expectations to make the on-site survey process more transparent, but continue to offer flexibility for laboratories to tailor the standards for their specific organization. For example, diagnostic guidance has been improved in areas such as genetic testing, flow cytometry, mass spectrophotometry and cytogenetics. In addition, the Blood Transfusion Service and Donor Center standards have been expanded and no longer reference the AABB standards for the survey process. Approximately 9% of the new standards and 32% of the new elements of performance are associated with removing the reference to AABB standards.

For more information, see www.jointcommission.org

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