Hospital Care

Patients are often harmed by inadequate care and outright medical mistakes in the days after they are sent home from the hospital, a study finds.

The study, conducted at one large hospital, found that nearly one in five patients had "adverse events" after they were sent home -- new or worsening symptoms resulting from the treatment they received, not from their underlying disease. Most of the problems could have been prevented or eased with better care.

The researchers say the problems often occur because hospitals fail to communicate effectively with patients and their primary care physicians upon discharge and neglect to follow up to identify symptoms and complications before they become more serious.

Researchers at the University of Ottawa and Harvard Medical School contacted 400 patients who were hospitalized at an unidentified urban teaching hospital. They found that 76 patients had adverse events after they were sent home. Of those, 23 were deemed preventable and 24 would have been less severe with better care.

The study's results are "not surprising," because patients are discharged from the hospital more quickly than in the past, and in worse shape, said Dr. Kenneth Kizer, president of the nonprofit National Quality Forum, which is working to develop better ways of measuring medical care.

Most of the problems resulted from drug side effects. In one case, an asthmatic patient who had suffered a heart attack was prescribed a beta blocker, a drug that slows the heart rate but can cause asthma attacks. The patient developed wheezing and a cough and two weeks later, a cardiologist discontinued the medicine.

In another case, an elderly patient with pneumonia fell in the bathroom and fractured two ribs within days of being released from the hospital.

In a third incident, a patient with an inflamed pancreas was sent home after his X-ray was misread. He was readmitted four days later with worsening symptoms.

Source: Associated Press

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