Should policy-makers and managers trust PSI? An empirical validation study of five patient safety indicators in a national health service.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Patient Safety Indicators (PSI) are being modestly used in Spain, somewhat due to concerns on their empirical properties. This paper provides evidence by answering three questions: a) Are PSI differences across hospitals systematic -rather than random?; b) Do PSI measure differences among hospital-providers -as opposed to differences among patients?; and, c) Are measurements able to detect hospitals with a higher than "expected" number of cases?

Methods

An empirical validation study on administrative data was carried out. All 2005 and 2006 publicly-funded hospital discharges were used to retrieve eligible cases of five PSI: Death in low-mortality DRGs (MLM); decubitus ulcer (DU); postoperative pulmonary embolism or deep-vein thrombosis (PE-DVT); catheter-related i

SUBMITTER: Bernal-Delgado E 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3350386 | biostudies-literature | 2012 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature