Variability in hospital occupancy negatively impacts the cost and quality of patient care delivery through increased emergency department (ED) congestion, emergency blockages and diversions, elective cancelations, backlogs in ancillary services, overstaffing, and understaffing. Controlling inpatient admissions can effectively reduce variability in hospital occupancy to mitigate these problems. ...

OBJECTIVE To conduct a cost-effectiveness analysis of a hospital electronic medication management system (eMMS). METHODS We compared costs and benefits of paper-based prescribing with a commercial eMMS (CSC MedChart) on one cardiology ward in a major 326-bed teaching hospital, assuming a 15-year time horizon and a health system perspective. The eMMS implementation and operating costs were obt...

BACKGROUND Hospital-centered violence intervention programs (HVIPs) reduce violent injury recidivism. However, dedicated cost analyses of such programs have not yet been published. We hypothesized that the HVIP at our urban trauma center is a cost-effective means for reducing violent injury recidivism. METHODS We conducted a cost-utility analysis using a state-transition (Markov) decision mod...

INTRODUCTION Contamination of hospital surfaces plays an important role in the transmission of several healthcare-associated microorganisms, therefore methods for evaluating hospital surfaces' cleaning gain particular importance. Among these, there are visual inspection, quantitative microbiology, fluorescent markers and adenosine triphosphate (ATP) bioluminescence. The latter seems to provide ...

provided the original work is properly cited. CC As the population is aging and chronically-ill patients have increased, the need of consultation has also increased [1]. And, as medical specialties become even more specialized, the dependency on consultation in patient evaluation and management has elevated. Appropriate use of consultation services might result in better prognosis for postopera...

BACKGROUND Diagnostic accuracy in neurology frequently depends on clinical assessment and neuroimaging interpretation. We assessed neuroimaging discrepancy rates in reported findings between general radiologists and neuroradiologists among patients from a district general hospital (DGH). METHODS A neuroradiologist's report was sought on selected DGH patients over 28 months. Pre-planned outcom...

BACKGROUND Among patients in skilled nursing facilities for post-acute care, increased registered nurse, total licensed staff, and nurse assistant staffing is associated with a decreased rate of hospital transfer for selected diagnoses. However, the cost-effectiveness of increasing staffing to recommended levels is unknown. METHODS Using a Markov cohort simulation, we estimated the incrementa...