The Joint Commission's Sentinel Event Policy, implemented in 1996, is designed to help health care organizations to identify sentinel events and take action to prevent their recurrence. A sentinel event is an unexpected occurrence involving death or serious physical--including loss of limb or function--or psychological injury, or the risk thereof. "Risk thereof" means that, although no harm occurred this time, any recurrence would carry a significant chance of a serious adverse outcome. Any time a sentinel …showed first 75 words of 1064 total…

…showed last 75 words of 1064 total…quality management in the critical care environment: a primer. Critical Care Clinics, 9, 455-463. Foggin, James H. "Meeting Customer Needs: Are Academic Programs in Touch with Their Customers?" Survey of Business. (Summer 2002), pp. 6-9. http://www.jcaho.org Tindill, B. S. and Stewart, D. W. (1993) Integration of Total Quality and Quality Assurance. In Al-Assaf, A. F. and Schmele, J. A. (eds) The Textbook of Total Quality in Healthcare. St Lucie Press, Delray Beach, FL, pp. 209-220