Showing posts with label hospital. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hospital. Show all posts

Thursday, September 23, 2010

Is Hospital a Safe Place to Go?

"Once considered safe havens, health care institutions today are confronting steadily increasing rates of crime, including violent crime."
Joint Commission


Since 2004, the number of assaults, rapes and murders reported to the Joint Commission rose steadily, with the greatest number of reports in the last three years. There were 36 incidents nationwide in 2007, 41 in 2008 and 33 in 2009. According to the Joint Commission’s voluntary reporting system, there were 256 assaults, rapes or homicides of patients and visitors at American health centers since 1995, with 110 of those acts occurring after 2007. That number is likely far lower than the actual number of incidents because violence in health settings is often underreported, the group said.


They further said that violence is often perpetrated by staff, visitors, patients and even intruders. What happened on Baltimore hospital wherein the gunman Warren Davis,who reportedly hid inside his mother's room, shot and killed himself and his mother is a perfect example of how violence is growing INSIDE the hospital. I'm talking here all the kinds of violence that were committed; assaults, rapes, homicides and many more.


Hospitals are supposedly one of the institutions and places wherein one could be at peace since healing and cure are happening here. This is where ill and sick people take refuge. However with this growing violence even inside the hospital, the hospital could pose a great threat for patients and even to the men and women in medical scrubs and nursing shoes who are working there. This event will eventually affect the medical world itself.


The proper authorities must make a move before it is too late. Where in the world would people who are sick and ill go if there are no institutions like hospitals? Or where could we find a peaceful place here on earth? Whew!

Posted by mizrachfaith at 11:04 PM 0 comments
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Friday, August 6, 2010

Hospital Food Goes Green


This may not be a news anymore because this happened last September 2009 but this is worth noting for. There is a program called Balance Menus which is a voluntary program that seeks to improve nutrition and benefit the environment by reducing meat purchasing among participating hospitals by 20 percent within 12 months. The program also promotes shifting towards serving more sustainably produced meat.

Developed and piloted by San Francisco Physicians for Social Responsibility, Balanced Menus
was first implemented in 2008 in four San Francisco Bay Area hospitals. In September 2009,
Health Care Without Harm launched the program nationally.

This program was implemented in four San Francisco Bay Area hospitals: Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital, the San Francisco VA Medical Center, the John Muir Health Medical Center, and one anonymous hospital. The hospitals vary in size as well as medical and food services provided, representing a broad range of possibilities for the program.

So what is the result of this program. Did the healthcare personnel,patients,doctors and nurses in medical uniforms grew thinner and unhealthier at the span of this program. Definitely not.

The Balanced Menus program implementation in these four hospitals exceeded the 20 percent meat reduction goal, and yielded substantial savings in costs and greenhouse gas emissions, as well as, potentially,some improvements in health for those eating reduced quantities of meat. The program’s expansion provides an important opportunity to further advance these goals. With a larger sample of hospitals and a longer time-span, future program evaluation work can gain an even clearer perspective on the program’s impacts.

This is actually a great news! If only all hospitals would do this, then even patients will be healthier and doctors too!

Posted by mizrachfaith at 1:25 AM 0 comments
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