Licensing – Page 6 – AZ Dept. of Health Services News

Striving for Excellence in Arizona’s Dialysis Facilities

By Cara Christ|2017-02-10T09:49:13-07:00June 25th, 2015|Licensing|

This year marked the third year that our Division of Licensing Services and Healthcare Associated Infection (HAI) Program partnered with the InterMountain ESRD Network and others to provide a day-long educational session for end-stage renal dialysis (ESRD) providers in Arizona. More than 200 participants attended this year’s ADVICE Collaborative to identify data-driven opportunities to improve [...]

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Medical Marijuana Sales Tripled in 2014

By Will Humble|2017-02-10T09:49:20-07:00January 16th, 2015|General, Licensing|

We published our end-of-year annual medical marijuana report this week. Dispensary marijuana sales were three times higher than in 2013. Dispensaries sold over 9 metric tons (about 10 US tons) of marijuana in 2014 for an estimated gross revenue of about $110M. There were 1,433,808 individual sales in ‘14 (among the 55,000 patients), with an [...]

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American Medical Response’s Application Approved

By Will Humble|2017-02-10T09:49:21-07:00January 5th, 2015|General, Licensing|

This morning I approved American Medical Response’s (AMR Maricopa) application to operate ambulances in Maricopa County (called a Certificate of Necessity or CON). I approved the Certificate of Necessity after reviewing a host of evidence presented to an Administrative Law Judge and her Order recommending approval. The official notice will be posted on the Office [...]

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Healthcare Associated Infections

By Will Humble|2017-02-10T09:49:21-07:00December 29th, 2014|Licensing, Prevention|

Healthcare-Associated infections continued to be a major (and largely preventable) threat to patient safety in Arizona during 2014 - although we had better results this year. The 2014 National and State Healthcare Associated Infections Progress Report found significant reductions for nearly all infections in Arizona. Arizona’s public health system takes a layered approach to preventing [...]

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Electronic Child Care Renewal Utility Goes Live

By Will Humble|2017-02-10T09:49:22-07:00December 26th, 2014|Licensing|

Our Child Care Licensing shop launched a new Child Care Licensing application last week. The Bureau regulates nearly 2,500 Child Care Centers in the state of Arizona. The new web application gives Child Care Centers a way to submit licensing (and enforcement) fees - increasing the efficiency of our processing time. The application is also designed as [...]

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Regulatory Reform

By Will Humble|2017-02-10T09:49:22-07:00December 25th, 2014|Behavioral Health, Licensing|

We met a major milestone in 2014 when we filed our final new set of regulations for Arizona’s 5,500 licensed healthcare facilities. We’ve now completed our overhaul of the State’s regulations of hospitals, behavioral health inpatient facilities, nursing care institutions, recovery care centers, hospices, behavioral health residential facilities, assisted living facilities, outpatient surgical centers, outpatient [...]

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Electronic Midwife Reporting Utility Goes Live

By Will Humble|2017-02-10T09:49:22-07:00December 24th, 2014|Licensing|

Our Special Licensing shop (which licenses certified professional midwives) went live with a new Midwife Electronic Reporting Utility last week…providing a secure online application for submission and viewing of midwife reports. Our certified professional midwives can now use the electronic reporting tool and our Midwife Survey Reporting Guide to track outcomes. The new web utility provides [...]

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Time to Comment on Newborn Screening Rules

By Will Humble|2017-02-10T09:49:24-07:00November 21st, 2014|Licensing, Preparedness|

Last month I wrote about how we are working on revising our Newborn Screening rules because of a change in state law. The changes include requiring hearing tests on all newborns, adding critical congenital heart defects screening and adding a screening for severe combined immunodeficiency started January 2016. The last test depends on whether we [...]

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Forensic Campus Hits the Mark

By Will Humble|2017-02-10T09:49:31-07:00August 26th, 2014|Licensing|

A few weeks ago Medical Facilities Licensing conducted a surprise complaint investigation of our Arizona State Hospital’s Forensic Campus. Last week we received notification that no deficiencies were found during the 3-day on-site inspection - which included an in-depth review of policies, procedures, documentation and patient care standards. Congratulations to the entire Forensic Campus team for a job well done - [...]

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Long-Term Care Infection Prevention and Control Collaborative

By Will Humble|2017-02-10T09:49:34-07:00July 18th, 2014|Licensing, Prevention|

Our Licensing, Preparedness and Healthcare-Associated Infections shops joined forces with APIC Consulting Inc. to provide a free day-long event to provide training to skilled nursing facilities about how to prevent healthcare-associated infections. The training will be based on the Infection Preventionist's Guide to Long-Term Care. The goals are to help healthcare providers to: 1) identify infection prevention [...]

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