Letters & E-Mails

Warning: ‘Someone May Be Shooting Back’
Re: "Guns in the Healthcare Workplace' (August, page 7). As healthcare workers, we do all sorts of things to ensure the safety of our patients, yet for some reason we fail to protect them on a basic level of securing their safety while they’re in our centers. I have my concealed carry and do not hesitate to carry on my off time. However, due to restrictions at work, I have to leave my weapon elsewhere. I consider myself and my co-workers to be sitting ducks just waiting to be picked off by someone who holds a grudge for any reason. It would be nice to let them know prior to entering the facility that someone may be shooting back!

Debbie Teetzel, RN, MSN
Rocky Mountain Surgery Center, Englewood, Colo.
[email protected]

Renegade Accreditation Surveyors
Re: "11 Dings That Might Surprise You”. Speaking as a retired Medicare surveyor (now consultant), accreditation surveyors must adhere to the standards to which they are surveying, not to their own interpretation of these standards. If there is no regulatory (not the Interpretive Guidelines) statement that refers to the issue, even indirectly, then the surveyors are imposing their own “underground” regulation, which cannot be enforced. A facility can only be cited under the CMS regulations for non-compliance with a regulation and/or nationally accepted standards of care and services. Under a Medicare survey, you can (diplomatically) challenge a potential citation by asking the surveyors to identify where, in the regulations or standards, the issue under review is in violation.

Bruce Ettinger, MD, MPH
Santa Monica, Calif.
[email protected]

For the Record
Tri-Moxi and/or Tri-Moxi+Vanc are the names of the compounded proprietary formulations that ophthalmologists inject into the vitreous during dropless cataract surgery. We misidentified the drug names in “Dropless” Cataract Surgery — Will it Work?. Tri-Moxi has 1 antibiotic (moxifloxacin hydrochloride). Tri-Moxi+Vanc has 2 antibiotics (moxifloxacin hydrochloride and vancomycin). The steroid in both compounded formulations is triamcinolone acetonide.