What do hospital mortality rates tell us about quality of care?

Emergency Medicine Journal

Volumn 32, Issue 3, 2015, Pages 244-247

  Goodacre, Steve ^a   Campbell, Mike ^a   Carter, Angela ^b  

^a UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD   (United Kingdom)

^b UNIVERSITY OF SHEFFIELD   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

AGE; ARTIFACT; CASE MIX; CLINICAL INDICATOR; COMORBIDITY; DIAGNOSIS; HEALTH CARE QUALITY; HEALTH SERVICE; HOSPITAL ADMISSION; HOSPITAL DISCHARGE; HUMAN; MORTALITY; NATIONAL HEALTH SERVICE; PREDICTIVE VALUE; PRIORITY JOURNAL; REVIEW; RISK ASSESSMENT; SEX; TREATMENT OUTCOME; STANDARDS; UNITED KINGDOM;

ENGLAND; HOSPITAL MORTALITY; HUMANS; QUALITY INDICATORS, HEALTH CARE; QUALITY OF HEALTH CARE; STATE MEDICINE;

EID: 84923386742     PISSN: 14720205     EISSN: 14720213     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1136/emermed-2013-203022     Document Type: Review

References (47)

1. Institute of Medicine. Crossing the quality chasm: a new health system for the 21st century. National Academy Press, 2001.
2. The NHS Health and Social Care Information Centre. Hospital Episodes Statistics for England, 1998-2012. http://www.hesonline.nhs.uk/
3. Report of the Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust Public Inquiry, 2013. http://www.midstaffspublicinquiry.com
4. Keogh B. Review into the quality of care and treatment provided by 14 hospital trusts in England: overview report. NHS England, 2013.
5. Dr Foster 2012 Hospital Guide. http://www.drfosterhealth.co.uk/
6. NHS Information Centre for Health and Social Care. http://www.ic.nhs.uk/home
7. Campbell MJ, Jacques RM, Fotheringham J, et al Developing a summary hospital mortality index: retrospective analysis in English hospitals over five years. BMJ 2012; 344:e1001.
8. Freemantle N, Richardson M, Wood J., et al. Weekend hospitalization and additional risk of death: an analysis of inpatient data. J R Soc Med 2012; 105: 74-84.
9. Jacques RM, Fotheringham J, Campbell M.J., et al. Did hospital mortality in England change from 2005 to 2010: retrospective cohort analysis. BMC Health Serv Res 2013. In press.
10. Duke G, Barker A, Santamaria J., et al. Recent trends in Victorian risk-adjusted in-hospital mortality: 1999-2009. Intern Med J 2012; 42: 1218-23.
11. Bottle A, Jarman B, Aylin P. Strengths and weaknesses of hospital standardised mortality ratios. BMJ 2011; 342:c7116.
12. Jarman B, Pieter D, van der Veen AA, et al. The hospital standardised mortality ratio: a powerful tool for Dutch hospitals to assess their quality of care? Quality Saf Health Care 2010; 19: 9-13.
13. Freemantle N, Richardson M, Wood J., et al. Can we update the Summary Hospital Mortality Index (SHMI) to make a useful measure of the quality of hospital care? An observational study. BMJ Open 2013; 3:e002018.
14. Goodacre S, Wilson R, Shephard N., et al. Derivation and validation of a risk-adjustment model for predicting seven-day mortality in emergency medical admissions. BMJ 2012; 344:e2904.
15. Shahian DM, Wolf RE, Iezzoni L.I., et al. Variability in the measurement of hospital-wide mortality rates. N Engl J Med 2011; 363: 2530-9.
16. Chong CA, Nguyen GC, Wilcox ME Trends in Canadian hospital standardised mortality ratios and palliative care coding 2004-2010: a retrospective database analysis. BMJ Open 2012:26; e001729 doi:10.1136/bmjopen-2012-001729.
17. van den Bosch WF, Spreeuwenberg P, Wagner C. Variations in hospital standardised mortality ratios (HSMR) as a result of frequent readmissions. BMC Health Serv Res 2012; 12:91.
18. Mohammed MA, Deeks JJ, Girling A, et al Evidence of methodological bias in hospital standardised mortality ratios: retrospective database study of English hospitals. BMJ 2009; 338:b780.
19. Nicholl J. Case-mix adjustment in non-randomised observational evaluations: the constant risk fallacy. J Epidemiol Community Health 2007; 61: 1010-13.
20. Lilford R, Pronovost P. Using hospital mortality rates to judge hospital performance: a bad idea that just won't go away. BMJ 2010; 340: 955-7.
21. Scott IA, Brand CA, Phelps G.E., et al. Using hospital standardised mortality ratios to assess quality of care-proceed with extreme caution. Med J Aust 2011; 194: 645-8.
22. Iezzoni LI. Validity and reliability of risk adjusters. In: Iezzoni LI, ed. Risk adjustment for measuring health care outcomes. 3rd edn. Chicago: Health Administration Press, 2003: 207-21.
23. Silva LK. Validity of the risk adjustment approach to compare outcomes. Cad Saude Publica 2003; 19: 287-95.
24. Thomas JW, Holloway JJ, Guire KE Validating risk-adjusted mortality as an indicator for quality of care. Inquiry 1993; 30: 6-22.
25. Dubois RW, Rogers WH, Moxley J.H., et al. Hospital inpatient mortality. Is it a predictor of quality? N Engl J Med 1987; 317: 1674-80.
26. Park RE, Brook RH, Kosecoff J, et al Explaining variations in hospital death rates. Randomness, severity of illness, quality of care. JAMA 1990; 264: 484-90.
27. Hartz AJ, Gottlieb MS, Kuhn E.M., et al. The relationship between adjusted hospital mortality and the results of peer review. Health Serv Res 1993; 27: 765-77.
28. Keeler E, Rubenstein L, Kahn K.L., et al. Hospital characteristics and quality of care. JAMA 1992; 268: 1709-14.
29. Hannan EL, Kilburn H Jr, O'Donnell JF, et al. Adult open heart surgery in New York State. An analysis of risk factors and hospital mortality rates. JAMA 1990; 264: 2768-74.
30. Gibbs J, Clark K, Khuri S., et al. Validating risk-adjusted surgical outcomes: chart review of process of care. Int J Qual Health Care 2001; 13: 187-96.
31. Daley J, Forbes MG, Young G.J., et al. Validating risk-adjusted surgical outcomes: site visit assessment of process and structure. National VA Surgical Risk Study. J Am Coll Surg 1997; 185: 341-51.
32. Wilson R, Goodacre SW, Klingbajl M, et al Evaluation of the DAVROS (Development And Validation of Risk-adjusted Outcomes for Systems of emergency care) risk-adjustment model as a quality indicator for health care. Emerg Med J 2014; 31: 471-5.
33. Hofer TP, Hayward RA Identifying poor-quality hospitals. Can hospital mortality rates detect quality problems for medical diagnoses? Med Care 1996; 34: 737-53.
34. Thomas JW, Hofer TP Accuracy of risk-adjusted mortality rate as a measure of hospital quality of care. Med Care 1999; 37: 83-92.
35. Quality at a glance: Using aggregate measures to assess the quality of NHS hospitals. MHP Health Mandate 2013.
36. West MA, Borrill C, Dawson J., et al. The link between the management of employees and patient mortality in acute hospitals. Int J Hum Res Manag 2002; 13: 1299-310.
37. Aiken LH, Smith HL, Lake ET Lower Medicare mortality among a set of hospitals known for good nursing care. Med Care 1994; 32: 771-87.
38. Jarman B, Gault S, Alves B., et al. Explaining differences in English hospital death rates using routinely collected data. BMJ 1999; 318: 1515-20.
39. Sprivulis CP, Da Silva JA, Jacobs IG, et al. The association between hospital overcrowding and mortality among patients admitted via Western Australian emergency departments. Med J Aust 2006; 184: 208-12.
40. Guttmann A, Schull MJ, Vermeulen M.J., et al. Association between waiting times and short term mortality and hospital admission after departure from emergency department: population based cohort study from Ontario, Canada. BMJ 2011; 342: d2983.
41. Sutton M, Nikolova S, Boaden R., et al. Reduced Mortality with Hospital Pay for Performance in England. N Engl J Med 2012; 367: 1821-8.
42. NHS Institute for Innovation and Improvement. Scoping of evidence in relation to interventions to reduce avoidable mortality. Matrix Research and Consultancy, 2006.
43. Robb E, Jarman B, Suntharalingam G., et al. Using care bundles to reduce in-hospital mortality: quantitative survey. BMJ 2010; 340:c1234.
44. Collum J, Harrop J, Stokes M., et al. Patient safety and quality of care continue to improve in NHS North West following early implementation of the European Working Time Directive. Q J Med 2010; 103: 929-40.
45. Hayward RA, Hofer TP Estimating hospital deaths due to medical errors: preventability is in the eye of the reviewer. JAMA 2001; 286: 415-20.
46. Girling A, Hofer TP, Wu J, et al Case-mix adjusted hospital mortality is a poor proxy for preventable mortality: a modelling study. BMJ Qual Saf 2012; 21: 1052-6.
47. Davies HTO, Mannion R. Will prescriptions for cultural change improve the NHS? BMJ 2013; 346:f1305.