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Centre for Policy on Ageing | |
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| Consequences of discharges from intensive care at night | | Author(s) | C Goldfrad, K Rowan |
| Journal title | The Lancet, vol 355, no 9210, 1 April 2000 |
| Pages | pp 1138-1142 |
| Keywords | Discharge [hospitals] ; Nightly ; Bed availability [hospitals]. |
| Annotation | It is generally believed that pressure for beds based on intensive care units (ICUs) has increased in the UK. This study used discharge at night as a proxy measure to investigate pressure. The rate of discharge at night was compared for 21,295 adult admissions to 62 ICUs during 1995-98 with 10,806 admissions to 26 ICUs during 1988-90. With data solely from 1995-98, the consequences of discharge at night and premature discharge were investigated. Overall, 2269 admissions (21%) did not survive the ICU in 1988-90, compared with 4487 (21.1%) in 1995-98. Of ICU survivors, 2.7% were discharged at night (2200-0659 hrs) in 1988-90 compared with 6% in 1995-98. In 1995-98, night discharges had higher overall mortality. This study notes that the practice of discharging patients at night is of concern, because they fare significantly worse than those discharged during the day. Night discharges are more likely to be "premature" in the view of the clinicians involved. The results imply that many hospitals have insufficient intensive care beds. Equally, hospitals and ICUs must ensure that they make best use of their facilities. (RH). |
| Accession Number | CPA-000508207 A |
| Classmark | LD:QKJ: 4RD: LD:QKW * |
Data © Centre for Policy on Ageing |
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| ...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing. |
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