Unexpectedly long hospital stays as an indicator of risk of unsafe care: an exploratory study.

ABSTRACT:

Objectives

We developed an outcome indicator based on the finding that complications often prolong the patient's hospital stay. A higher percentage of patients with an unexpectedly long length of stay (UL-LOS) compared to the national average may indicate shortcomings in patient safety. We explored the utility of the UL-LOS indicator.

Setting

We used data of 61 Dutch hospitals. In total these hospitals had 1 400 000 clinical discharges in 2011.

Participants

The indicator is based on the percentage of patients with a prolonged length of stay of more than 50% of the expected length of stay and calculated among survivors.

Interventions

No interventions were made.

Outcome measures

The outcome measures were the variability of the indicator across hospitals, t

SUBMITTER: Borghans I 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4054630 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature