RHS Quality Improvement & Patient Safety 2 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: What does FMEA stand for as used in healthcare quality management?
- Failure Mode and Effects Analysis (Correct answer)
- Functional Management and Error Assessment
- Federal Medical Error Audit
- Facility Monitoring and Evaluation Assessment
Correct answer: Failure Mode and Effects Analysis
Failure Mode and Effects Analysis (FMEA) is a proactive risk assessment tool used to identify potential failure points in a process before they result in patient harm.
Question 2: Which type of medication error involves administering the correct drug to the wrong patient?
- Prescribing error
- Wrong-patient error (Correct answer)
- Transcription error
- Dispensing error
Correct answer: Wrong-patient error
A wrong-patient error occurs when a correct medication is administered to the wrong patient, underscoring the critical importance of two-patient identifier verification.
Question 3: The surgical 'time-out' procedure is performed immediately before incision primarily to:
- Allow the anesthesia team to finalize medication dosing
- Verify correct patient identity, surgical procedure, and operative site (Correct answer)
- Confirm operating room scheduling and equipment availability
- Document informed consent and insurance authorization
Correct answer: Verify correct patient identity, surgical procedure, and operative site
The surgical time-out is a pause before incision during which the team collectively verifies the correct patient, correct procedure, and correct surgical site to prevent wrong-site surgery.
Question 4: Conditions that develop as a result of treatment in a hospital — not present on admission — are clinically referred to as:
- Iatrogenic events
- Nosocomial conditions (Correct answer)
- Sentinel outcomes
- Adverse drug reactions
Correct answer: Nosocomial conditions
Nosocomial conditions (hospital-acquired conditions or HACs) develop during a hospital stay as a result of care or the environment, not from the patient's original presenting illness.
Question 5: Which of the following is NOT one of the traditional 'Five Rights' of medication administration?
- Right patient
- Right dose
- Right time
- Right diagnosis (Correct answer)
Correct answer: Right diagnosis
The Five Rights are right patient, right drug, right dose, right route, and right time — diagnosis is a clinical decision separate from the mechanics of safe administration.
Question 6: Which organization accredits U.S. hospitals and publishes annual National Patient Safety Goals?
- Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)
- The Joint Commission (TJC) (Correct answer)
- American Medical Association (AMA)
- Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS)
Correct answer: The Joint Commission (TJC)
The Joint Commission (TJC) is the primary accrediting body for U.S. hospitals and annually publishes National Patient Safety Goals to drive targeted safety improvements.
Question 7: In patient safety, a clinical 'bundle' is best defined as:
- A collection of incident reports submitted as a group
- A set of evidence-based practices implemented together to improve patient outcomes (Correct answer)
- A group of bundled insurance billing codes for related services
- A cohort of patients with similar diagnoses managed under one protocol
Correct answer: A set of evidence-based practices implemented together to improve patient outcomes
A care bundle is a structured set of evidence-based practices that, when implemented together consistently, improve patient outcomes more than when applied individually.
RHS Quality Improvement & Patient Safety 2
What does FMEA stand for as used in healthcare quality management?