Mortality, length of stay worse for January, Friday, and 12 a.m. to 6 a.m. admissions
TUESDAY, May 28 (HealthDay News) -- For patients with congestive heart failure, admission in January, during the night (12 a.m. to 6 a.m.), or on Friday is associated with significantly worse outcomes, according to a study presented at the European Society of Cardiology's annual Heart Failure Congress, held from May 25 to 28 in Lisbon, Portugal.
David P. Kao, M.D., from the University of Colorado in Denver, and colleagues used hospital discharge data for all hospitals in the state of New York to examine the correlation between seasonal, weekly, and hourly variation in heart failure hospitalization and in-hospital outcomes. The cohort included 949,907 hospitalizations for congestive heart failure from 1994 to 2007.
The researchers found that for daily admissions, in-hospital mortality, and length of stay, seasonal trends were identified (peaks in February, January, and January, respectively). Mortality and length of stay were highest for admissions between 12 a.m. and 6 a.m. (adjusted odds ratio of death, 1.22) and were lowest for admissions between 6 a.m. and noon. In addition, mortality and length of stay were highest for those admitted on Friday (adjusted odds ratio of death, 1.09) and lowest for those admitted on Monday.
"The fact that patients admitted right before the weekend and in the middle of the night do worse and are in hospital longer suggests that staffing levels may contribute to the findings," Kao said in a statement.
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