Dive Brief:
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While numerous previous studies have concluded patients who receive weekend surgeries fare worse than patients who receive surgeries during the week, a new study has analysed hospitals to uncover five ways to help offset the so-called weekend effect.
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The study, published in this month's issue of Annals of Surgery, comes from researchers at Loyola University Medical Center and Loyola University Chicago.
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The identified resources include an increased nurse-to bed ratio, full implementation of EMRs, inpatient physical rehabilitation, a home-health program, and a pain management program.
Dive Insight:
Given that poorer weekend outcomes are typically attributed to reduced hospital resources, the new report focused on how hospitals can make up for those reductions.
It determined staffing and resources "can play an important role in ensuring patients are not disadvantaged by being admitted to the hospital on the weekend."
The research is based on records of 126,666 patients at 166 Florida hospitals that particpated in a Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality database program. Researchers focused on 17 hospitals that managed to overcome their weekend effect, controlled for patient characteristics, and identified the five resources that appeared to make a difference.
A follow-up study will examine data from California hospitals.