Administrators may want to think twice before reducing nursing staff if they care about patient safety in their cardiovascular operating rooms. Circulating nurses prevented or corrected on average 11.11 medical errorseither potentially harmful incidents or incidents they stopped before harm was donerelated to cardiac surgical procedures, according to a recently published study.

The FDAs Circulatory Systems Devices Panel is scheduled to meet June 13 to discuss the safety and efficacy of Edwards Lifesciences' Sapien Heart Valve System. In preparation for the meeting, the FDA has posed a series of questions for panel members to consider.

CHICAGOWhen building regional cardiovascular service lines, focus on cost, speed and quality, said Gregory D. Timmers, CEO of Prairie Cardiovascular, during a presentation June 7 at the 2nd annual MedAxiom Cardiovascular Service Line Symposium. However, when starting from the ground up, Timmers recommended mastering two goals and the third will come soon after.

Invasive-interventional cardiologists earn more in median compensation per holiday, weekend and per day of on-call coverage than did most of their cardiology bretheren, according to a report released June 4. The median daily rate for invasive-interventional cardiologists was $650, equal to on-call pay for noninvasive cardiologists but $450 more than what other invasive cardiologists received.

Everyone is in a hurry these days, but the emergency medical services (EMS) may not have enough pep in its step when it comes to treating STEMI patients. In fact, James G. Jollis, MD, told Cardiovascular Business that nearly 90,000 patients in the U.S. are not treated according to the guidelines. Now, statewide STEMI care networks may provide a solution to help cut time to reperfusion and improve outcomes.

The number of nonacute PCIs deemed inappropriate varies broadly across the U.S. However, a study found that a hospitals proportion of inappropriate PCI use was not linked to in-hospital mortality, periprocedural bleeding and medication use post-PCI. The studys lead author, Steven M. Bradley, MD, MPH, told Cardiovascular Business that the results show room for improvement, especially in terms of patient selection.

While hospitals are constantly ranked on performance, how accurate are these assessments? Based on research published in the May issue of Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes that found these methods may be imprecise, rankings should not be used for comparisons of risk-adjusted cardiac mortality rates, the authors wrote.

Several vascular surgery codes have undergone changes and more coding modifications will occur this year. With the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) moving toward bundled payments, vascular surgeons are facing dwindling reimbursement. How can they ensure adequate payments? Teri Romano, RN, MBA, a consultant at Karen Zupko & Associates in Chicago, provides tips.