Modern technology can mean the difference between life and death when it comes to hospital care, but the human factor is also important.
Hospitals by their very nature can be intimidating environments. Castle Medical Center pays special attention to patient safety.
"We've dedicated many resources - education, technology, all the state of the art things that we can possibly come up with to help patient safety," said Laura Westphal, a registered nurse at Castle.
Primary concern for hospital personnel when it comes to patient safety? The potential for falls.
"Patients can also have hospital-acquired conditions such as pressure ulcers which is a breakdown of your skin if you've laid in a place too long. Put a lot of work into that. Catheter associated infections from having different tubes in your body," Westphal said.
When it comes to patient safety, hospital staffers try to keep up with the latest information.
"We have annual education and then we do ad hoc in services when we learn about a new product or a new process, we write policies, we educate the policies, we have hands on demonstrations," Westphal said.
What is the best approach when it comes to patient safety?
"Evidence-based practice that we follow and we have seen great success by following simple measures consistently with a check list mentality that we always do this, this, this and that," Westphal said.
Finally, the hospital offers a patient's handbook -
"We've also included a phone number that patients can call the rapid response team themselves and what our rapid response team is a team of ICU nurses, somebody from Lab, somebody from respiratory therapy," Westphal said.
All of whom are looking after the patient's well-being.
