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Study: Doctors managing discharged patients don't get info they need

August 11, 2009 — 3:23pm ET | By Anne Zieger
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medical errors
Journal Of General Internal Medicine
Discharge Summaries
test results

Far too often, doctors caring for patients being discharged from hospitals don't get the tests, data and other information they need to conduct good follow-up care, according to a new study.

The study, which appears next month in the Journal of General Internal Medicine, examined 668 hospital discharges with pending test results. Researchers found that just 16 percent of the 2,927 tests with pending results were mentioned in the discharge summaries. Also, a full 72 percent of test results which called for treatment changes weren't mentioned in discharge summaries.

Meanwhile, only 67 percent of discharge summaries indicated which primary care outpatient doctor was responsible for following up with the patient after discharge.

These results could easily lead to medical errors, researchers concluded.

To learn more about the study:
- read this UPI item

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Comments

By Anonymous | Posted 2:02pm | August 12, 2009

I wonder at the interpretation the study and conclusions the article draws.
Are the test actually necessary or do they represent a bit of defensive medicine?
Does this speak more to the number of patients that do not have a PCP or insurance to support follow up care?
Should patients hold a bed while the dictation of results are transcribed several days later and then reviewed by the hospitalist?
Are physicians presumptive in their medical opionion that the patient should be discharged?
If 72 % of test results that called for a change in Tx were test that were not completed and analyzed before the discharge are they part of a notation to the discharge summary or medical record per hospital policy? What is typical of hospital policy regarding post discharge diagnostics.
This study and article would be more captivating if it demonstrated x% readmission rate or even a denial of payment based on incomplete records.

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