The Patient Safety, Science & Technology Movement announced that hospitals and medical technology companies made commitments to eliminate preventable patient deaths by 2020 at a patient safety summit Jan. 13.

Unnecessary hospital readmissions occur for various reasons, including incomplete discharge planning, a lack of follow-up from the hospital, patients' difficulty in adhering to medication regimens and patients' inability to visit a provider for follow-up. However, one factor underlies all these…

Seguin, Texas-based Guadalupe Regional Medical Center will begin negotiating the purchase of South Texas Surgical Center, according to a Seguin Gazette report.

Massachusetts hospitals can now share drugs to ease shortages exacerbated by the closing of two pharmaceutical companies following a fungal meningitis outbreak this fall, according to a Boston Globe report.

The Institute of Medicine identified a need for an international agreement to reduce the amount of falsified, substandard and counterfeit pharmaceuticals in a new report.

A free toolkit on caring for diverse populations developed by the Industry Collaborative Effort Cultural and Linguistics Workgroup is available from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality Innovations Exchange.

Healthcare organizations must regularly conduct a risk assessment to comply with The Joint Commission.

A bill in Oregon could restore a loan repayment program to assist primary care providers who would work in underserved areas of the state, according to The Lund Report.

The physician shortage in New York State is reaching critical levels, as the state currently needs more than 1,200 physicians, according to the results of Healthcare Association of New York State's 2012 Physician Advocacy Survey.

The National Committee for Quality Assurance has accredited The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia as an accountable care organization.