Policy Manual sample

MDT Home Health Care Agency, Inc. RISK MANAGEMENT Risk Management is a method of identifying, evaluating, and treating the Agency’s risk of financial loss. A well-managed program serves the interest of clients, employees, the agency, and the public. Central to the operation of the program is a reporting system of incident or unusual occurrences with respect to any aspect of the operation of the Agency, after a trend is established, an appropriate intervention could be carried out to solve the problem (see Incident Report, Medical Device Incident Report). All professional staff (Nurses, Therapists), have an important function in reporting any incidents in order to ensure that risk are documented and identified. Our Agency will create and analyzes our Risk Management Annual Report, who must reflect all adverse incidents according to statutory definition, which occur in our facility in the course of a calendar year. Risk management strategies are employed to identify and monitor potential areas of liability, including the following occurrences: Unusual occurrences/sentinel events Consumer/patient complaints Employee grievances Workplace/safety violations Liability for Negligence Agencies run the risk of liability for negligence whenever we provide services to patients. In order to prove this type of liability, patients must prove all of the following: Agency owed patients a duty of reasonable care. Agency breached our duty of reasonable care to patients. The Agency can breach our duties to patients in either of the following ways: 1) Agency staff members can do something that they should not do; or 2) Contractors can fail to do something that they should have done. Agency’s breach(es) of duty caused injury or damage to patients. The best way to define 'cause' is in terms of 'but for.' But for the Agency's breach of duty, patients would not have been injured or damaged. In order to prove injury or damage, patients must show physical injury or damage or extreme and outrageous conduct on the part of Agency. Extreme and outrageous conduct is behavior that is barbaric, shocking, cannot be tolerated in civilized society, and causes one to gasp. Patients must prove all three of these requirements. If they fail to prove even one of them, Agency will defeat patients' lawsuits based on negligence. The use of Skill, High Tech Services, Test Equipment/Machines includes the potential for instances of negligence in addition to potential liabilities associated with 'hands on' or 'in person' Home Health Agency Nursing Manual J-69