Nestled in the massive immigration bill that's being debated now in Congress are a handful of provisions that could ease the process that allows foreign-born physicians to practice in underserved areas across the United States. Sections dealing with revisions to the Conrad State 30 Program...
Credentialing Resource Center Digest - Volume 14, Issue 24
The American College of Cardiology and the American Heart Association have expanded the clinical practice guideline for managing patients with heart failure. The guideline updates definitions and classifications for heart failure and increases emphasis on patient-centric outcomes such as quality...
Credentialing Resource Center Digest - Volume 14, Issue 24
The American Hospital Association has voiced support for the Health Care Safety Net Enhancement Act (S. 961/H.R. 36), legislation that would provide medical liability protections under the Federal Tort Claims Act to hospitals and physicians providing emergency care.
Credentialing Resource Center Digest - Volume 14, Issue 24
Mandatory influenza vaccination as a condition of employment did not cause healthcare workers to flee from Loyola University Medical Center in Maywood, Ill., according to a four-year analysis of vaccination rates. With the backing of hospital leadership, infection control and prevention...
Members of the public are open to physician assistants and nurse practitioners playing a greater role in healthcare delivery, according to a recent Health Affairs study. Researchers analyzing the Association of American Medical Colleges’ Consumer Survey data for December 2011 to January...
The public may be more willing to accept wider roles for some healthcare professionals, but the debate over expanding practitioners’ scope of care rolls on, as this week’s news showed. A study in Health Affairs suggests there is potential for growth in the role that physician assistants...
Credentialing Resource Center Digest - Volume 14, Issue 23
Have you developed standards for assessing the competency of locum tenens, telemedicine, or new technologies at your facility? Medical staff professionals and physician leaders must be prepared for the challenges these areas create for competency assessment.
Credentialing Resource Center Digest - Volume 14, Issue 23
The average 30-day hospital readmission rate fell to 18.4% in calendar year 2012 from 19% during the previous five years, according to analysis by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS). That translates to about 70,000 fewer readmissions for the year, CMS said.
Credentialing Resource Center Digest - Volume 14, Issue 23
More hospitals and large multispecialty groups are promoting their "top doctors" as patient magnets, but leadership and physicians alike must proceed with caution when advertising their best practitioners, according to an ethics column on the amednews.com website.
Credentialing Resource Center Digest - Volume 14, Issue 23
Nurses, dentists and psychologists asked the Illinois Legislature this spring for more authority to make medical decisions with demand expected to surge under the federal health care law, but each time lawmakers sided with doctors and turned them down.
