Authors

  1. Section Editor(s): Jackson, Rita PhD, RD

Article Content

The Joint Commission has released its 2007 National Patient Safety Goals and requirements, which go into effect on January 1, 2007, for hospitals, long-term care, ambulatory care and office-based surgery, assisted living, behavioral health care, critical access hospitals, disease-specific care, home care, and health care networks.1

 

In general, the goals and requirements have been reformatted for clarification purposes. Rationales were added to most standards; and expectations for implementation were added to each standard.

 

One major change for all settings is the expansion of the standard for involving patients and family members more in reporting safety concerns.

 

There also has been a revision in the standard for patient identifiers; the definition of "staff" under the human resources (HR) standards; list of abbreviations; medication distribution; "critical" tests; and communications to minimize medical errors.

 

Specific changes can be found in the following reference or in updates to accreditation manuals, and the Joint Commission provides answers to frequently asked questions on its website at http://www.jointcommission.org/Standards/NationalPatientSafetyGoals.

 

References

 

1. The Joint Commission announces the 2007 national patient safety goals and requirements. Joint Commission Perspectives. July 2006;26:1,5-31. [Context Link]