Advances in research on patient outcomes and greater availability of detailed standardized administrative data on healthcare outcomes, particularly for patients admitted to hospital, enable examination of the performance of providers and health systems from new perspectives. In a linked paper, Tsugawa and colleagues (doi:10.1136/bmj.j1797) devised a creative research design to exploit these res...

of discharge. The study aimed to calculate a hospital readmission rate, to investigate the timing of readmissions, and to identify risk factors associated with readmission. The readmission rate was 27% with the majority of readmissions occurring within three months after discharge, suggesting the need for investigation of such early readmissions. The three factors found to predict readmission w...

OBJECTIVES The Hospital Readmissions Reduction Program mandates reimbursement reductions to hospitals with higher than expected rates of readmissions. We examine causes and predictors of readmissions following major procedures in urologic oncology. MATERIALS AND METHODS Using the American College of Surgeons National Surgical Quality Improvement Program database, patients undergoing radical p...

OBJECTIVE To assess how well the LACE index and its constituent elements predict 30-day hospital readmission, and to determine whether other combinations of clinical or sociodemographic variables may enhance prognostic capability. DESIGN Retrospective cohort study with split sample design for model validation. SETTING One large hospital Trust in the West Midlands. PARTICIPANTS All alive-d...

CONTEXT Surgical treatment for proximal humerus fractures has increased exponentially. Recent health care policies incentivize centers to reduce hospital readmission rates. Better understanding of risk factors for readmission and early mortality in this population will assist in identifying favorable risk-benefit patient profiles. OBJECTIVE To identify incidence and risk factors of 30-day hos...

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES Pneumonia is a leading cause of hospitalization and readmission in children. Understanding the patient characteristics associated with pneumonia readmissions is necessary to inform interventions to reduce avoidable hospitalizations and related costs. The objective of this study was to characterize readmission rates, and identify factors and costs associated with readmi...

OBJECTIVES/HYPOTHESIS Unplanned readmissions within 30 days of surgery represent a significant marker for healthcare quality. Small institutional studies have described rates of readmission for patients undergoing head and neck free flap reconstruction. However, large, multi-institutional analyses have not previously been described. STUDY DESIGN Retrospective study of cases from the American ...

AIM To reduce readmissions and improve patient outcomes in cirrhotic patients through better understanding of readmission predictors. METHODS We performed a single-center retrospective study of patients admitted with decompensated cirrhosis from January 1, 2011 to December 31, 2013 (n = 222). Primary outcomes were time to first readmission and 30-d readmission rate due to complications of cir...

Background: Radical cystectomy is associated with perioperative complication rates exceeding 50% in some series. Readmission rates are increasingly used as a surgical quality metric. White blood cell count is a crude surrogate for physiologic processes which may reflect postoperative complications leading to readmission. Objective: We assessed the association between final white blood cell coun...

BACKGROUND A real-time electronic predictive model that identifies hospitalized heart failure (HF) patients at high risk for readmission or death may be valuable to clinicians and hospitals who care for these patients. METHODS An automated predictive model for 30-day readmission and death was derived and validated from clinical and nonclinical risk factors present on admission in 1372 HF hosp...