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Restraint concerns play a role in leadership shake-up

Healthcare Security Weekly, December 31, 2007

State officials in North Carolina have shaken up the leadership at Broughton Hospital in Morganton amid accreditation concerns after Joint Commission (formerly JCAHO) surveyors found nearly 30 deficiencies at the facility, including problems involving the use of physical restraints, reported The Charlotte Observer earlier this month.

The hospital was already cited last August by the federal government for a number of issues, many of them focused on patient safety and the use of restraints, the article said. The government cut Medicare and Medicaid funding at Broughton because of concerns over the February death of a patent who suffocated after a staff member sat on his torso and the injury of another patient in August. The hospital has since brought in teams of physicians and administrators to "reorganize the clinical staff, and retrain every staff member, from housekeepers to doctors," according to the Observer.

A spokeswoman from the state Department of Health and Human Services told the Observer that the new director has "a good reputation, and we're hoping that with (him) in there, we'll be able to make things happen more quickly."

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