Thứ Tư, 13 tháng 6, 2012

POLST - Include Patient Photo?

A Dungarvin LLC assisted living facility in my neighborhood was just reprimanded by the Minnesota Department of Health for failing to resuscitate a patient.  The patient had been choking, and staff summoned EMS.  But when EMS arrived, staff presented them with a DNR order.  So, EMS did not resuscitate.  Unfortunately, the DNR order was not the patient's but was another patient's.  




It seems that matching the order to the patient is an area presenting some risk of error, especially in the emergency context.  Perhaps this risk could be readily mitigated by including the patient's photo on the order.  Why have lower safeguards for a POLST than for a driver's license, passport, or library card?  I do not think any state's implementation of POLST includes this.  But perhaps they should.

  


0 nhận xét:

Đăng nhận xét