Rescue rate sets better hospitals apart

ANN ARBOR, Mich., Oct. 6 (UPI) -- A U.S. study debunks assumptions about the role of complications in distinguishing good hospitals from bad ones, researchers said.

The study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, confirms that serious complications are common after major surgery -- occurring in about one in six patients -- but the study shows what drives hospital mortality is failure to rescue the patient.

Study author Dr. John D. Birkmeyer, professor of surgery and chairman of surgical outcomes research at the University of Michigan Medical School, said low-mortality hospitals have medical teams with the ability to rescue patients by recognizing and heading off potentially catastrophic complications such as deep wound infections, pneumonia, kidney failure, blood clots and strokes.

Despite similar patterns of complications, patients at high mortality hospitals are nearly twice as likely to die after developing serious post-surgical complications, Birkmeyer said.

The researchers used data on 84,730 patients undergoing general and vascular surgery at 186 hospitals participating in the American College of Surgeons -- National Surgical Quality Improvement Program.

"Our finding was what distinguishes high quality hospitals and low quality hospitals is how proficient they are at rescuing people once a complication has happened," Birkmeyer said in a statement.