Here's what happens when you let people who use scalpels and other sharp implements on a daily basis near pumpkins.

From Beth Israel, which staffed the medical tents for Hub on Wheels:

Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center is replacing bottled water with tap water in pitchers for meetings:

... I understand that part of the reason we have been serving bottled water instead of tap has to do with the misperception that our tap water is dirty and unsafe. Because this perception has more to do with the successful marketing campaigns of bottled water companies than reality we would like your help in supporting and promoting this shift to a more environmentally sustainable model. This shift will be successful if we work together to educate our meeting participants.

What folks should know is that tap water is at a minimum as clean and safe as bottled water but often it is cleaner and safer. ...

Jim Hurst, chief of surgery at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center details an extensive surgical procedure and recovery (and relapse and more recovery) in the unit he normally oversees.

... The next setback came on April 14. Pam McColl removed my sutures and uttered that word no one likes to hear, "Hmmm." I hate that word. ...

The Supreme Judicial Court ruled today a fired Beth Israel Deaconess doctor will get her day in court, because the contract she signed didn't specifically mention sex discrimination as an issue to be decided outside the court system.

The ruling comes in a suit filed against Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center by Dr. Carol Warfield, who alleges Dr. Josef Fischer, chief of surgery, got her fired as anesthesiologist-in-chief out of sexism, and that hospital management did nothing to stop "a relentless pattern of gender-based discriminatory treatment" over several years before she was fired.

USA Today says Boston has the nation's longest wait times to get an appointment for a specialist. Beth Israel Deaconess CEO Paul Levy discusses the medical center's efforts to cut wait times for its clinics:

Over one year, the average wait time for all of our medicine clinics has dropped from 13 days to 4.4 days.

The hospital is trying to cut that to 3 days. Levy says part of the drop is due to the use of "mystery shoppers," who file detailed reports on their experiences as "patients."

Such as veterinary services, medical center CEO Paul Levy writes.

Earlier:
Some patients showed up early.

Wild turkeys in front of Beth Israel this morning.

Paul Levy reports that all the bar-code scanners in the world are still not a substitute for a trained nurse - who thought the bag of medicine she'd just checked out was "slightly heavier than usual" and sure enough, the dosage was higher than it should have been, due to what turned out to be a mistake at the drug wholesaler.

The state Department of Public Health says Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center failed to adequately deal with outbreaks of antibiotic-resistant staph in its maternity unit.

Medical Center CEO Paul Levy has posted a memo on the state citation and what the hospital is doing about it. He adds all the cases have been treated successfully and none involved babies or parents in the neo-natal intensive care unit.