BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE Rapid recovery protocols after total hip arthroplasty (THA) have been introduced worldwide in the last few years and they have reduced the length of hospital stay. We show the results of the introduction of a rapid recovery protocol for primary THA for unselected patients in our large teaching hospital. PATIENTS AND METHODS In a retrospective cohort study, we included a...

BACKGROUND Hospitalists are increasingly being used for inpatient care. OBJECTIVE To investigate whether the use of hospitalists is beneficial. DESIGN Retrospective cohort study. SETTING Inpatient medical service of a 500-bed community teaching hospital. PARTICIPANTS 1620 patients in the study group, seen during the hospitalist year; 1679 patients from the same outpatient practice as th...

E. A. BINEY, G D. ODURO, D. D. YAR, C. K. OPPONG, K. NYAME, P. K. FORSON, R. OTENG, I. BOAKYE, B. NORMAN, D. ANSONG, E. OWUSU-DABO and P. DONKOR Accident & Emergency Department, Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital, Kumasi, Kumasi Centre for Collaborative Research in Tropical Medicine, University of Michigan, Department of Emergency Medicine, Ann Arbor, USA, Research and Development Unit, Komfo Anoky...

OBJECTIVES In hospitals, the pharmacy information system (PIS) is usually a sub-system of the hospital information system (HIS). The PIS supports the distribution and management of drugs, shows drug and medical device inventory, and facilitates preparing needed reports. In this study, pharmacy information systems implemented in general teaching hospitals affiliated to medical universities in Te...

OBJECTIVE Urgent care centres (UCCs) co-located within an emergency department were developed to reduce the numbers of inappropriate emergency department admissions. Since then various UCC models have developed, including a novel general practitioner (GP)-led UCC that incorporates both GPs and emergency nurse practitioners (ENPs). Traditionally these two groups do not work alongside each other ...

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE Stroke cost consumes a large proportion of the gross domestic product in all developed countries, and while health care costs are rising, the ability to contain them is diminishing. METHODS We calculated the cost of acute stroke care for all first admissions to a teaching hospital in Toronto, Canada, in 1991 through 1992 for 285 consecutive patients. RESULTS The avera...

Benefits derived from the Council for Health Services Accreditation South Africa (COHSASA) accreditation of the Universitas Academic Hospital (UAH) in Bloemfontein are illustrated. Accreditation assessments were performed between 2001 and 2007, and full compliance with the COHSASA standards for Academic Hospitals was achieved. An initiative to develop thoracic surgery in central South Africa (S...

This study describes vancomycin prescribing patterns in an average complexity hospital and compare the guidelines proposed by the Hospital Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee (HICPAC). The study was conducted in a 256-bed secondary-care hospital. Data were collected of all patients given vancomycin from March 2003 to February 2004, using a standardized chart-extraction form designed....

OBJECTIVE To determine the patient and hospital characteristics associated with severe manifestations of 'poor glycemic control'-a 'no-pay' hospital-acquired condition defined by the US Medicare program based on hospital claims related to severe complications of diabetes. DESIGN A nested case-control study. SETTING California acute care hospitals from 2005 to 2006. PARTICIPANTS All cases ...

An instrument was developed to study the use of hospital beds and discharge arrangements of a cohort of 847 admissions to the John Radcliffe Hospital, Oxford, for a three week period during February-March 1986. For only 38% of bed days were patients considered to have medical, nursing, or life support reasons for requiring a provincial teaching hospital bed. The requirements for a bed in the ho...