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sylvanthus

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My ED is apparently rolling out a new camera system in every room and by every sink to monitor how long rooms are empty, how soon we get into the patient room, how often we wash our hands etc etc etc. Our hospital apparently volunteered for this nonsense to be the first ED to be this ******ed. We also now have concierge people in suits walking around trying to boost our press ganey scores. As a resident (still) my hands are tied and I am stuck unfortunately. Half tempted to slow way the fuk down though, but know no good would come of it.

Thoughts on this ridiculousness? Think it will spread to other EDs? God help us if this becomes the norm.

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We use rfid to gather data on people and equipment movement and have been for the past two years or so now. Initially people were pretty concerned about being tracked but now people love it. We can find equipment like NP scopes, tonopen easily. We can show data to other services on their consult times and give praise or work together to improve it. We have been able to find inefficiencies in the way we transport patients to tests etc and improve it.....the staff and leadership truly love it.

I don't know exactly how the cameras will work or the culture of trust in your shop, but it may work out better than you think.

As for PG scores, whether we like them or not, if a hospital doesn't take them seriously eventually either people, equipment, or wages will suffer and possibly two or three of them. It's just a reality.

If you slow down, it hurts your education. You only have a handful of years to learn the craft and I wouldn't let anyone or anything keep you from maximizing that time. Your future is too important a thing to compromise in an attempt to vent your frustrations against your department.


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We use rfid to gather data on people and equipment movement and have been for the past two years or so now. Initially people were pretty concerned about being tracked but now people love it. We can find equipment like NP scopes, tonopen easily. We can show data to other services on their consult times and give praise or work together to improve it. We have been able to find inefficiencies in the way we transport patients to tests etc and improve it.....the staff and leadership truly love it.

I don't know exactly how the cameras will work or the culture of trust in your shop, but it may work out better than you think.

As for PG scores, whether we like them or not, if a hospital doesn't take them seriously eventually either people, equipment, or wages will suffer and possibly two or three of them. It's just a reality.

If you slow down, it hurts your education. You only have a handful of years to learn the craft and I wouldn't let anyone or anything keep you from maximizing that time. Your future is too important a thing to compromise in an attempt to vent your frustrations against your department.


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I'm going to guess how this plays out is institution specific, the culture of yours being a bit unique. I can see it being more punitive at some places than educational/ informative for troubleshooting, true QI etc.
 
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Continue to take good care of your patients and do your best to ignore the cameras.

This crap only has as much impact as we give it.
 
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We have cameras in 4 of our ED rooms, but rarely turn them on. Our "normal" patients HATE them. It really bothers THEM to think there are cameras in their room. I'd work from that angle to change this policy. Hand your patients a complaint card as you discharge them and suggest they complain about the camera in their room. Bet they're gone in a month.
 
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I can't imagine the suites watching the videos on a "need to know" basis for patient care. How is this not a HIPAA violation?
 
I can't imagine the suites watching the videos on a "need to know" basis for patient care. How is this not a HIPAA violation?
HIPAA allows non-disclosed use of protected health information for 3 separate things, treatment, billing, and healthcare operations. This would fall under healthcare operations such as education or quality assurance/improvement. The hospital I did most of my rotations at recorded 4 of the 8 trauma bays for use in review for the EM and general surgery residencies.
 
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We use rfid to gather data on people and equipment movement and have been for the past two years or so now. Initially people were pretty concerned about being tracked but now people love it. We can find equipment like NP scopes, tonopen easily. We can show data to other services on their consult times and give praise or work together to improve it. We have been able to find inefficiencies in the way we transport patients to tests etc and improve it.....the staff and leadership truly love it.

I don't know exactly how the cameras will work or the culture of trust in your shop, but it may work out better than you think.

As for PG scores, whether we like them or not, if a hospital doesn't take them seriously eventually either people, equipment, or wages will suffer and possibly two or three of them. It's just a reality.

If you slow down, it hurts your education. You only have a handful of years to learn the craft and I wouldn't let anyone or anything keep you from maximizing that time. Your future is too important a thing to compromise in an attempt to vent your frustrations against your department.


Sent from my iPhone using SDN mobile


I loved the RFID idea when I interviewed at Mayo. The camera thing sounds weird though, I don't feel like it would provide enough data to allow for improvement of flow or anything of that nature.
 
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Couldn't this be a disaster from a medico-legal perspective? If this becomes the norm, eventually tapes will become part of evidence. I know it's easy to say "just practice good medicine," but things can be used selectively *against* us.

Also, what about those times we write S1, S2 normal, and forget that we never listened to the heart?? (I've changed my template away from these useless things like S1 and S2, but still...)

I would honestly refuse to work in a place with cameras in the rooms.
 
Cameras in an exam room? I guess there are some positives, but so so so many negatives. Geeezzz.....

If i were a resident, I would put my head down and finish. If I were a resident, I would put my head down and finish no matter what they made me do.

But as an attending, I am out of there
 
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