Smart CIOs are realizing that their success, not to mention their career survival, depends on selecting and nurturing crack teams of IT executives at the director and vice president level. Those smart CIOs also understand they must distribute some of the prestige — and the responsibility — to make things work in an emerging high-pressure, high-profile environment. Read our Cover Story, “IT Takes a Village,” page 46, to see how industry-leading CIOs are surrounding themselves with talented executive teams.
Once a medication order is placed by the physician, it has to get filled in the pharmacy and back to the patient. Part II of our three-part series on medication administration, “It's a Pill,” page 18, looks at what systems can help CIOs and pharmacists keep safety levels high, and what some say is the absolute deal breaker for closed loop to work.
Lately, facilities are finding that scheduling solutions can extend beyond the nursing department by integrating with business management and billing applications. Along with that development, functions like trend reporting and analytics tools are changing the face of staff planning. In “A Shift in Staffing,” page 28, we look at hospitals that have implemented Web-based, self-service scheduling systems to increase clinician satisfaction, manage patient throughput, and reduce costs.
Correction:
In last month's finance story (May 08), the status labels on the following graph (regarding Massachusetts) were incorrect. The correct graph is below:
