Legal Issues

by Heidi H. Cross, MSN, RN, FNP-BC, CWON "If a patient is cold, if a patient is feverish, if a patient is faint, if he is sick after taking food, if he has a bed sore, it is generally the fault not...

I have been there, done that. Sitting in the fact witness chair in front of a plaintiff attorney who is wildly waving a copy of my facility’s wound care policy and procedure, demanding to know why cer...

By Heidi Cross, MSN, RN, FNP-BC, CWON Since the advent of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), I haven’t done much flying, but I love travel and I love flying. One of my favorite experiences is a w...

by Heidi H. Cross, MSN, RN, FNP-BC, CWON Failure to T&P (turn and position) is always part and parcel of a pressure ulcer lawsuit and a key element of a complaint related to pressure ulcers, as ill...

by Heidi H. Cross, MSN, RN, FNP-BC, CWON When looking at medical charts from a legal perspective, one of the areas closely scrutinized is the risk assessment for skin breakdown and pressure ulcer d...

By Heidi Cross, MSN, RN, FNP-BC, CWON "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times." – Charles Dicken When Charles Dickens wrote this introduction to his Victorian-era novel, A Tale of T...

The following is a wrap up of the 2019 pressure injury guidelines of the National Pressure Injury Advisory Panel (NPIAP)1 related to nutrition, of which there are 15. For guidelines #1 to #10, see my ...

Pressure injury risk and development are multifactorial, individualized processes. Each patient presents with a unique set of circumstances and needs. In looking at charts for attorneys to determine w...

In the previous blog, I briefly went through the standards of care when it comes to nutrition and pressure injury (PI) prevention and development and discussed what a large role nutrition plays in PI ...