ABSTRACT
PURPOSE: To determine the impact of the Patient Safety Program on the safety culture of nursing department. METHODS: Patient Safety Program focused on medication safety was launched by QI team and patient safety committee. Patient Safety Program was composed of the establishment of improved reporting system as s way to learn from error, 'Patient Safety Guard' movement, and continuous education for medication safety. With one group pretest-posttest design, nurses' perception of the safety culture were measured with self-administered questionnaire. Subjects were all nurses and managers in nursing department of a tertiary teaching hospital in Seoul. Collected data from survey was statistically analyzed using t-test. RESULTS: Patient Safety Program had been continued for 20 months in participation of all nurses and managers. Safety culture was improved (pretest=2.84, posttest=2.90, p<.001; 4 point scale). CONCLUSIONS: This study indicates that there has been a statistically significant increase in the nurses' perception of safety culture. These findings suggest that Patient Safety Program had made great contribution toward system wide safety culture in the hospital. To improve safety culture, leadership supports and flexibility to apply tailored interventions to the hospital were required necessarily.
Subject(s)
Humans , Hospitals, Teaching , Leadership , Patient Safety , Pliability , Qi , Surveys and QuestionnairesABSTRACT
OBJECTIVES: This study was performed to examine the health status measured by SF-36 and medical facilities utilization according to the health status measured by SF-36 in male workers. METHODS: A self-administered questionnaire survey was administered to 786 male workers. RESULTS: In bivariate analysis, physical functioning score was significantly different among the workers according to age, educational level, economic level, and job type. The bodily pain score and general health score were significantly different according to the workers'economic level and job type. The vitality score was significantly different according to the workers'age, educational level, economic level, and job type. The social functioning score was significantly different according to the workers'age, marital status, economic level, and job type. The role limitation emotion score was significantly different according to the workers'age, marital status, and job type. The mental health score was significantly different according to the workers'marital status, economic level, and job type (p<0.05). The SF-36 scores increased with higher workers'self-rated health status (p<0.05). The self-rated current health status of the workers was good when their economic status was high, their previous year health status was good and their SF-36 score was high (p<0.05). The rates of morbidity incidence and medical facilities utilization for 1 year were lower when workers'SF-36 score was high (p<0.05). CONCLUSIONS: In consideration of the above findings, SF-36 is suitable to measure health status and predict the medical utilization.
Subject(s)
Humans , Male , Incidence , Marital Status , Mental Health , Surveys and QuestionnairesABSTRACT
OBJECTIVE: We examined the vasoconstricting poperties of endothelin (ET) on isolated arteries from pregnant as well as non-pregnant uterus. METHODS: Arteries of the uterus were obtained from both hysterectomized uterus and during pregnany hysterectomy for control group and cesarean section for pregnant group. Rings of uterine artery were suspended on muscle chambers at their optimal length for generating tension and contractile properties were examined. RESULTS: ET-1 and ET-2 induced concentration-dependent constriction of both isolated arterial strips from non-pregnant and pregnant uterus. The contraction to ET-1 and ET-2 were more enhanced in full-term pregnancy. Furthermore, in pregnant group, sarafotoxin S6c and IRL 1620, ET. agonists, induced a dose-dependent contraction, which was not shown in those from non-pregnant human. Pretreatment of human uterine arterial strips from pregnant uterus with BQ610, an ET. antagonist, for 10 min resulted in a dose-related rightward shift of ET-1 response curve with diminution of maximal response. Schild plot analysis yielded a pA value of 7.29 with a slope of 0.98. However, BQ788, an ET antagonist, did not produce any rightward shift. The contraction to lower concentration (10-8~3*10-7 M) of sarafotoxin S6c was not affected by BQ788, whereas that to higher concentration (10-s-8*10-7 M) was marked diminished. However, BQ610 did not exnt any efFect on sarafotoxin S6c-induced contraction in arterial staips from pregnant uterus. When the bath solution was replaced with Ca-free physiological salt solution (PSS) containing 1 mM EGTA for 10 min prior to adding sarafotoxin S6c, sarafotoxin S6c-induced contraction was completely abolished. Sarafotoxin S6c (10 nM)-induced contraction was prefetentially blocked by a protein kinase C antagonist, H-7, whereas it was less sensitive to a calmodulin antagonist, calmidazolium, CONCLUSION: Based on above results, we concluded that ET plays an important role in regulating uterine blood flow through the activation of ETa and ETB receptors. Furthermote, ETB receptors may predominantly contribute to the modulation of human uterine circulation in full-term pregnancy.