The Joint Commission

Week 2 Assignment

The Joint Commission

HCS 430 – Legal Issues in Healthcare:

Regulation and Compliance

University of Phoenix

Kathlean Brissett-Greene

July 16, 2010

Instructor: Joann Wilcox

In 1910, Dr. Ernest Codman, M.D., proposes the “end result system of hospital standardization.” This system required hospitals to track every patient who had long-term treatment to determine whether the treatment was effective. What the hospital would have to do next would be determined by the result of said treatment. The hospital in turn would have to determine why the treatment was not successful, so that if similar cases came up they would know how to threat that illness for a successful outcome.

The mission of the Joint Commission is continuous improvement of health care for the public. The Joint Commission does this by continuous evaluation of health care organization and setting standards for which they will aspire to provide a safe and effective care of highest quality and value. The Joint commission declared mission is “to continuously improve health care for the public, in collaboration with other stakeholders, by evaluating health care organizations and inspiring them to excel in providing safe and effective care of the highest quality and value.”

The Joint Commission formerly Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organization (JCAHO) is a not-for-profit private sector base organization that started in 1951. Their job is to evaluate healthcare organization and hospitals to see if they meet the standard for accreditation. If the organization meets, the standards then the Joint Commission will submit an application on behalf of the organization to Center for Medicare Services (CMS).

The main purpose of the Joint Commission is to address organization’s performance level in key functional areas such as patient rights, medication safety, infection control, and patient treatment. Joint Commission is about patient safety, patient...