Medicare Surveyors Hold Hospitals to Tough New Anesthesia Standards

ATLANTA, March 5, 2013 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Every hospital that accepts Medicare or Medicaid reimbursement must follow the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Conditions of Participations (CoPs). However, hospital managers and executives don't have time to sort through hundreds of pages of interpretive guidelines regarding changes to anesthesia and sedation standards. Also, they don't always know what documents surveyors will be looking for when they come to their facility or what questions they will ask. There is no time to delay: Most of the most recent changes to the CoPs were effective immediately.

Help is on the way. AHC Media, which is the healthcare industry's most trusted resource for newsletters, online information, books and webinars, has published "Cracking the Code: Understanding the CMS Hospital CoP Standards on Anesthesia." The book offers 4.5 hours of continuing nursing education credit.

This new book explains the anesthesia standards and post anesthesia care unit (PACU) standards. The chapters are organized in the order in which the anesthesia standards are contained in the hospital CoP manual. The book covers:

• anesthesia services;
• organization and staffing;
• preanesthesia evaluations;
• the intraoperative anesthesia record and required policies and procedures; and
• postanesthesia assessments.

"We include hundreds of pages of policies and procedures and other informative practical material you can start using immediately," says Joy Daughtery Dickinson, executive editor. "These can save you dozens of hours you would spend if you were developing these materials from scratch."

Here is a sampling of the documents included:

• Difficult Airway Alert Form;
• Policy Statement on Rapid-sequence Intubation;
• Standards for Postanesthesia Care;
• Adverse Event Protocol;
• Safe Injection Practices; and
• many more!

The book also includes Frequently Asked Questions, along with an explanation of what these answers mean to providers and hospitals.

The author is the renowned Sue Dill, RN, Esq., CPHRM, BSN, MSN, JD, president, Patient Safety and Health Care Consulting, Dublin, OH, and former chief learning officer, Emergency Medicine Patient Safety Foundation, Folsom, CA.

To learn more about Cracking the Code: Understanding the CMS Hospital CoP Standards on Anesthesia, which is available in multiple formats, please go to http://bit.ly/118jCoT.

CONTACT: Joy Daughtery Dickinson, Executive Editor
(404) 262-5410

SOURCE AHC Media