Increasing Patient Safety Through Provider Monitoring
As a growing number of organizations begin to continuously monitor their licensed practitioners, patient safety will improve significantly, advises Medversant Technologies, the nation’s provider of Web-based credentials verification solutions for hospitals and managed care organizations. With an estimated 250,000 patients reportedly killed each year as a result of preventable medical errors — and millions more injured — steps to increase patient safety are being taken in healthcare organizations throughout the U.S.
“One important step toward improved patient safety is continuous provider monitoring,” says Matthew Haddad, CEO of Medversant. “Continuous provider monitoring is not simply a once-in-a-while check of provider licenses but a multiple-times-per-month check of every provider’s license, DEA certification, OIG status and a host of other information. This provides a real time status of all providers providing care to patients.”
The healthcare industry does not currently perform such checks because of the labor costs traditionally involved in this process. However, a recent Medversant survey found that nearly 10 percent of caregivers surveyed had serious credentials issues including lack of licensure and sanctions. Recently, its was reported in New York State that more than 2 percent of all doctors practicing in New York last year landed on the state medical board’s watch list because of substance abuse and mental health concerns alone.
“At any given time, it is alarming to learn that virtually no healthcare organization is actually aware of whether a nurse, therapist or doctor rendering care on its behalf actually has a current license or has no critical issue with their status,” Haddad states. “However, Medversant’s technology has changed the paradigm for patient safety.”
Medversant’s systems automatically and continuously check licenses and other databases for changes and report on any issues. This eliminates 95 percent of the cost of performing this function manually. Moreover, patients do not have to perform their own costly background checks on providers which generally only yield basic information. Medversant’s systems have access to confidential non public information that only the healthcare organization has access to. Armed with better up to the minute information, these organizations can act swiftly to prevent providers with serious background issues from harming patients.
Haddad adds that health organizations across the care continuum are now using Medversant’s monitoring technology including Alliance Imaging, MemorialCare health system, California county health departments including Santa Clara, Alameda and Contra Costa counties, Alameda Alliance, Medical Eye Services, Cirrus Health, Century City Doctors Hospital, Medical Eye Services, DSI Holdings, Transplant Associates of Baylor, and many other organizations across the U.S.
“These organizations can proudly say to their patient communities that they care about patient safety and are taking important steps to minimize risk,” says Haddad. “It just stands to reason that any patient would rather go to a facility that is monitoring its providers continuously than one that does not.”
About Medversant
Medversant Technologies LLC is the leading provider of Web based healthcare practitioner management applications. Headquartered in Los Angeles, CA. Medversant can be reached at 213.291.6139 or www.medversant.com.