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Currents To Medical Center Employees: A recent University HealthSystem Consortium (UHC) webcast focused on the experiences of several hospitals that recently completed Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JCAHO) surveys. The webcast participants stressed the need for hospitals to have well defined patient safety programs in keeping with the six 2003 National Patient Safety Goals. JCAHO expects all patient safety goals to be implemented across the organization and for outcome measures to be collected and analyzed. Any goal not fully implemented will result in a Type I finding (penalty).      The six National Patient Safety Goals are: Improve accuracy of patient identification; improve communication effectiveness among caregivers; improve safety of high alert medications; prevent wrong-site, wrong patient, wrong procedure events; improve the safety of infusion pumps and prevent free-flow; and improve the effectiveness of clinical alarms.  MUSC Medical Center staff need to be familiar with these goals, and we need to be knowledgeable of methods implemented to fulfill the goals.    Specific information concerning our initiatives to meet the patient safety goals can be located on the MUSC Medical Center Intranet. Click on “Performance Improvement, go to Quality Network, and click on Patient Safety. (Plans are to streamline the navigation to this website in the near future). Anyone with questions should contact Rosemary Ellis, director of Quality (e-mail:  ellisro@musc.edu or call 792-0855).      Thank you very much.   W. Stuart Smith Vice President for Clinical Operations and Executive Director, MUSC Medical Center STAR Productions presents ‘The Quiz Show’ Lois Kerr, Accredited Programs, put managers to the test as she quizzed the communication meeting attendees on April’s JCAHO topics including first dose medication, human resources, operative and invasive procedures, and continuum of care.     “Remember everyone, it’s imperative that you share this information with your units,” Kerr said. “Surveyors don’t want to talk to you, they want to talk to your staff members.”    Rosemary Ellis, Quality director, distributed airheads and starbursts to quiz participants. The “Quiz Show” will take place each month to keep JCAHO standards fresh in managers’ minds until MUSC’s JCAHO survey in November. Spotlight on Hiring Processes Stuart Smith, Medical Center vice president of clinical affairs and executive director, discussed the importance of complying with the Office of Federal Contract Compliance in respect to making hiring choices. His suggestions included refraining from making the minimum job requirements for a given position too vague or general, referring every applicant to university or medical center human resources departments, and responding in a reasonable amount of time to all applicants for a given position. Helena Bastian, Medical Center Human Resources director, echoed Smith’s comments and noted that record keeping and documentation of the hiring process/job posting is key in order to comply with federal and state standards.    Susan Carullo, Employment, Compensation and Employee Relations manager, mentioned the online application process and the burden it helps to bear when dealing with approximately 12,000 applications per year. Carullo told managers about a new computer system, PeopleAdmin, set for implementation in July 2003. A total online system, it provides the applicant the ability to complete and save an application and periodically visit the system for updates, status check, new posts, etc. For managers, the new system means less paperwork, quick emails with all of the applications attached, and the ability to get information to human resources much quicker. The Web address for the new system will be muscjobs.com and will include an ongoing posting cycle, with the abandonment of dreaded Wednesday deadlines. Announcements Nancy Draffin, Social Work Services manager, presented a new Intranet database available to medical center employees. With the idea of compiling resources for all types of patients in need of a primary care medical home including those unfunded and underinsured, Draffin and her team researched and compiled listings of clinics throughout the state.     The CHCR icon on the Intranet will allow you to pull this information by the patient’s county and give the patient the information needed to access this resource. For more information, go to http://www.musc.edu/medcenter/chcr/index.html.    Catalyst Online is published weekly, updated as needed and improved from time to time by the MUSC Office of Public Relations for the faculty, employees and students of the Medical University of South Carolina. Catalyst Online editor, Kim Draughn, can be reached at 792-4107 or by email, catalyst@musc.edu. Editorial copy can be submitted to Catalyst Online and to The Catalyst in print by fax, 792-6723, or by email to petersnd@musc.edu or catalyst@musc.edu. To place an ad in The Catalyst hardcopy, call Community Press at 849-1778.