SILICON VALLEY, CA – Following failed internal quality improvement efforts targeting drug-seeking patients, one California hospital took on a new tactic for difficult-to-deal-with patients.
Like every other hospitalized patient who needs additional hospital wristband identification for their risk factors (e.g. seizure precautions, fall risk), those acting like self-righteous petulant children were tagged with bright orange, indestructible wristbands labeling them as “Pain in the A**.”
CEO Mark Zuckerburg, from Stars Alliance Health Institutions, had this to say about the new wristbands: “Unfortunately, the previously successful results from Hanover could not be replicated, so we designed a better way to safely recognize this particular group of ‘at-risk’ patients.” Pet therapy was another such strategy that failed this institution, prompting them to utilize the new wristband technique.
The idea was originally designed by medical student volunteers who enrolled in their school’s Quality Improvement Track.
Since adoption, this method has reduced patient complaints, nursing calls, and most importantly, readmission rates. Psychologist Dan Rather commented, “It must have something to do with the failure of the reward system when these ‘flagged’ patients complain, and their concerns are not acknowledged by medical personnel… Sort of an adult Ferber method, if you will.”
Twelve hospitals along the West Coast have taken up these orange wristbands and achieved similar results. Formal criteria have been established for wristband use and are listed here.
Patients must meet 1 of 9 criteria for wristband identification:
- Patients who “swear I don’t do drugs”
- Patients who fling poo
- Patients with pseudoseizures
- OSH-bombs
- People who’d rather have measles than vaccines
- Patients requiring a 1:1 for safety
- Patients with allergies to epinephrine “heart racing”
- Patients with soda in hand, here for GI ache
- Patients with 12/10 pain
