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At least 1,135 records · Page 63Linked to original sources
PubMed2005

The café fire on New Year's Eve in Volendam, the Netherlands: description of events.

AIM OF STUDY: The café fire at Volendam occurred shortly after midnight on the first of January 2001 and resulted in one of the worst mass burn incidents in recent Dutch history. The aim of this study was to provide insight into medical and organisational requirements of a major burns incident. METHODS: Shortly after the fire, two university hospitals and a burn center in the region of the accident developed a plan for evaluation of medical care given during and after this major burn incident. A multidisciplinary research group investigated the management of victims at the scene, in the emergency departments (ED) and during admission in the hospitals. All 245 casualties were included in this study. RESULTS: A brief severe fire occurred in a crowded cafe with around 350 young visitors on a small embankment of a relatively isolated town, resulting in a unusually high number of severely injured burn victims. Four died immediately. The ensuing rescue effort was hampered by poor access and chaotic circumstances. At the scene of the incident, mobile medical teams ensured orderly transport and treatment priority for the injured. There were 245 victims with a median total body surface area burned of 12%. Inhalation injury was present in 96 patients. A total of 182 victims were admitted, with 112 to intensive care. Ten patients died in the hospital. Seventy-eight patients were secondarily transported, many to specialised centers in the Netherlands and abroad. In total, 36 hospitals in three countries participated. CONCLUSION: An incident with high numbers of burn victims poses a challenge to any health care system. The difficult circumstances at the site demonstrated the need for robust organisational structures. The primary and secondary distribution of patients required coordination, general hospitals were able to provide initial medical care to these major burn casualties.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1990

Hospital-wide distribution of nuclear medicine studies through a broadband digital network.

Nuclear medicine provides a good environment for the evaluation of picture archiving and communication systems (PACS) because of the relatively small quantity of digital data that are generated, leading to reduced requirements for storage, display, and transmission compared with those found in radiology. The PACS in nuclear medicine is characterized by use of a single computer as a central storage, display, and analysis node. Images are acquired with use of small, low-cost computers attached to each camera. This network configuration offers advantages of convenience, but with great reliance on a single computer. A campus-wide picture network is under development at Washington University employing broadband cable television technology supplemented by baseband Ethernet (Digital Equipment Corp, Maynard, MA) components. All areas of diagnostic radiology and nuclear medicine are connected via a PACS testbed project. A radiology information system, supporting over 250 terminals, provides digital tracking of patients and report generation and retrieval. A new image workstation is under development in conjunction with Digital Equipment Corp. This system will permit display in multiple windows of report information and images from various modalities. A lung scan demonstration project is now beginning that is designed to test the value of a PACS in nuclear medicine. Digitally acquired chest radiographs will be displayed on an image workstation in nuclear medicine along with digital ventilation and perfusion lung scans. It is hoped that time-consuming logistic bottlenecks now encountered in lung scan interpretation will be reduced.

Computer Communication Networks↗
PubMed1997

From WING to MMSA: experiences with the implementation of a distributed HIS.

The following paper analyses the transition from a host centered to a client-server based Hospital Information System (HIS) which takes place at the University Hospital of Giessen, Germany, since 1995. It focuses on the overall concept and practical realisation of the cornerstone within this transition, the Macintosh Mosaic Software Architecture (MMSA) which delivers now more than 90% of the clinical data which is entered on the wards and within the operating rooms. Besides the technical problems of the project, the paper also describes some aspects of the organisational challenges which took place within a typical German University Hospital during the last 4 Years and which mainly affect the daily management of a large HIS.

Germany↗
PubMed2004

Role of semiautomatic defibrillators in a general hospital: "Naples Heart Project".

In Italian hospitals, 85% of patients hospitalized in general medical wards who experience cardiac arrest die, while the incidence is much lower in patients in intensive care units. Defibrillation, in Italian hospitals, often occurs very late, either due to a lack of defibrillators, or due to architectural and structural barriers. The object of an in-hospital emergency service is to prevent and treat cardiac arrest without subsequent complications, such as brain damage, renal failure etc. The Naples Heart Project was based on a feasibility study of the in-hospital emergency service to evaluate and analyze problems associated with type of structure, departmental and institutional dislocation, internal practicability (architectural features and preferential ways), staff numbers and distribution, the calling system for emergency, and the equipment available. The Naples Heart Project began in July 2001, since then it has already created 835 BLSD first responders among the hospital staff; 440 were physicians and physicians still in training, 310 were nurses and 85 were administrative staff.

Automation↗
PubMed2005

Psychiatric admissions and hospitalization in Israel: an epidemiologic study of where we stand today and where we are going.

BACKGROUND: Analysis of the trends in psychiatric admissions and discharges is necessary to correctly plan and distribute resources, especially given the current international climate of "deinstitutionalization." Israel, too, is implementing "reform" in the national psychiatric system - to transfer psychiatric treatment from a hospital to a community setting. OBJECTIVES: To analyze admission and discharge patterns, explore trends in psychiatric hospital length of stay, and compare these characteristics between first-episode and chronic patients, between children, youth and adults, and between hospitals. METHODS: All admissions and discharges from inpatient psychiatric wards between the years 2000 and 2004 were analyzed and characterized according to age, length of hospitalization, legal status, and nature of admitting institution (state hospital, health fund, general hospital). RESULTS: Mean length of stay in adults decreased during the 5 year study period, from 37.6 days in 2000 to 36.4 days in 2004. In years with higher admissions, hospital stay was shorter (P < 0.05). Length of stay in psychiatric wards in general hospitals was shorter than in state hospitals (P < 0.001). In contrast to adults and children, length of stay among adolescents showed a gradual increase (P < 0.05). Involuntary hospitalization comprised 25.3% of all admissions, and 16.8% of discharged patients were re-admitted within 30 days. A dramatic decrease (24.3%) in the number of chronic hospitalizations was noted. CONCLUSIONS: Various factors may account for these developments. Protracted hospitalizations may be reduced through changes in various aspects of treatment planning and psychiatric care continuum. The decrease in number of admissions, length of stay and number of chronically admitted patients remains in line with international practices. Particular attention needs to be devoted to planning and funding so that availability of community services matches reduction in psychiatric hospitalization.

Adolescent↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Designing computer support for daily hospital staffing decisions.

This paper relates issues encountered in extending a centralized computer-based nurse scheduling system to support daily staffing decisions in a hospital environment. When calculating the daily staffing needs on each nursing unit, the conceptually simple interactive staffing system incurred considerable costs in categorizing patients according to level of care required. Two years of historical data collected daily in a 568 bed St. Louis hospital were used to test the sensitivity of relative staffing requirements to daily fluctuations in patient-care distributions. A periodic sampling plan appears adequate for updating distributions which can then be applied to current census in estimating daily staffing needs. Recommendations for implementing such a system are offered.

Computers↗
PubMed1988

Uncompensated care pools and care to the uninsured: lessons from the New York Prospective Hospital Reimbursement Methodology.

One policy response to both the growing number of uninsured and the increased volume of uncompensated care is the development of revenue pools to explicitly finance uncompensated care. Despite the growing popularity of this response, few analyses have examined their success in financing uncompensated care and improving access to the uninsured. This study examines one such program developed as part of New York State's all-payer rate-setting system. The results indicate that the revenue pools improved the financial condition of New York hospitals but were less effective in improving access to care by the uninsured. The latter result was traced to the method selected by New York to measure "need" and distribute payments to hospitals. If the goal of such programs is to earmark payments to the uninsured, methods other than the New York system should be employed.

Data Collection↗
PubMed1989

Allocating capital in a multi-hospital system.

Healthcare systems must have an efficient and equitable way of allocating limited capital resources to their operating units. An effective capital allocation method has two key components: a formula that addresses the quantitative challenge of distributing capital, and scrutiny by corporate, regional, and local management to ensure that the formula works fairly.

Capital Expenditures↗
PubMed2003

Patterns of hospital admissions and emergency room visits among patients with scleroderma in South Carolina, USA.

OBJECTIVE: Little research has examined patterns of hospitalization and use of emergency rooms (ER) among patients with systemic sclerosis (SSc). We compared the incidence of hospitalizations and ER visits across 3 race groups (non-Hispanic white, non-Hispanic black, other) and determined predictors of referral to the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC), a major referral center for patients with SSc residing in the southeastern United States. METHODS: Data were obtained on all South Carolina hospitalizations (1996-2000) for patients who were ever hospitalized for a diagnosis of SSc during that time period. Hospitalization and ER incidence rates were determined in conjunction with corresponding population sizes obtained from the 2000 US Census, and rates were compared across race, sex, and age groups using Poisson regression models. Logistic regression was used to determine predictors of being treated at MUSC. RESULTS: The hospitalization incidence rate was significantly (p < 0.05) higher among blacks compared to whites (rate ratio 1.66; 95% confidence interval 1.41, 1.96), as was the ER incidence rate (rate ratio 1.78; 95% CI 1.50, 2.11). Even after adjusting for sex, age, median household income, primary insurance claim payor, county, and comorbidity, blacks were 60% less likely (p < 0.05) than whites to receive inpatient treatment at MUSC. Similar results were observed when comparing other non-whites to whites. CONCLUSION: The increased hospitalizations and ER visits among non-whites provide additional evidence of greater disease burden among these population groups. Despite this increased burden, non-whites are less likely to receive care at a major SSc referral center.

Academic Medical Centers↗
PubMed2004

Coding response to a case-mix measurement system based on multiple diagnoses.

OBJECTIVE: To examine the hospital coding response to a payment model using a case-mix measurement system based on multiple diagnoses and the resulting impact on a hospital cost model. DATA SOURCES: Financial, clinical, and supplementary data for all Ontario short stay hospitals from years 1997 to 2002. STUDY DESIGN: Disaggregated trends in hospital case-mix growth are examined for five years following the adoption of an inpatient classification system making extensive use of combinations of secondary diagnoses. Hospital case mix is decomposed into base and complexity components. The longitudinal effects of coding variation on a standard hospital payment model are examined in terms of payment accuracy and impact on adjustment factors. PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Introduction of the refined case-mix system provided incentives for hospitals to increase reporting of secondary diagnoses and resulted in growth in highest complexity cases that were not matched by increased resource use over time. Despite a pronounced coding response on the part of hospitals, the increase in measured complexity and case mix did not reduce the unexplained variation in hospital unit cost nor did it reduce the reliance on the teaching adjustment factor, a potential proxy for case mix. The main implication was changes in the size and distribution of predicted hospital operating costs. CONCLUSIONS: Jurisdictions introducing extensive refinements to standard diagnostic related group (DRG)-type payment systems should consider the effects of induced changes to hospital coding practices. Assessing model performance should include analysis of the robustness of classification systems to hospital-level variation in coding practices. Unanticipated coding effects imply that case-mix models hypothesized to perform well ex ante may not meet expectations ex post.

Comorbidity↗
PubMed1980

Regional hospice network offers system benefits.

Hospice programs can develop multi-institutional arrangements to ensure high-quality care and to plan for orderly distribution and location of programs. Three Illinois hospitals in conjunction with the local HSA have developed a hospice network that will maintain institutional autonomy while coordinating many administrative functions.

Health Systems Agencies↗
PubMed1983

Guidelines can resolve turf battles between local and corporate boards.

The relationship of a local board that is a member of a multihospital system with the corporate board of the system is a confusing one for trustees. This article provides a model for the distribution of power between corporate and local boards of hospitals that are owned or leased by a multihospital corporation.

Community-Institutional Relations↗
PubMed1996

Population-based analysis of treatment of pancreatic cancer and Whipple resection: Department of Defense hospitals, 1989-1994.

BACKGROUND: The influence of hospital experience and referral patterns on the operative mortality rate of pancreaticoduodenectomy was studied in a worldwide hospital system. METHODS: We analyzed computerized data on pancreatic cancer patients from U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) hospitals from 1989 to 1994. RESULTS: Six hundred ninety-eight patients had pancreatic cancer, and 130 Whipple operations (105 for pancreatic and 25 for other cancers) were performed with an 8.5% 30-day operative mortality rate. Although most resections were done in teaching hospitals performing more than 1 Whipple procedure per year, their results were not superior to smaller, lower volume nonteaching hospitals. Patients transported for resection were younger than patients undergoing resection at their local DOD hospital but had similar outcomes. The operative mortality rate was higher after unusual resections and with increasing age; the tumor stage had no effect. Unresected patients undergoing combined radiation and chemotherapy had the longest survival times. Radiation therapy was associated with significantly longer survival times in patients without distant metastases, but chemotherapy was associated with a longer survival time when metastases were present. CONCLUSIONS: This mortality rate 8.5% for Whipple resections matches that from other large populations. Equivalent results were obtained in DOD teaching hospitals and smaller, community-type institutions. Because the DOD medical system minimizes financial and logistic barriers to transfer, the even distribution of DOD pancreatectomy mortality suggests that these barriers may favorably influence single institutional outcomes.

Adenocarcinoma↗