Higher hospital resource use was associated with lower 180-day mortality among heart failure patients, with Spearman correlations of -0.68 for hospital days and -0.93 for direct costs.
Cohort (n=3,999)
Yes
Is higher hospital resource use associated with lower mortality in patients hospitalized for heart failure?
Hospitals that used more resources caring for patients hospitalized for heart failure had lower mortality rates, highlighting the importance of analyzing all patients rather than only expired individuals.
Effect estimate: Spearman r -0.68 and -0.93
BACKGROUND: Recent studies have found substantial variation in hospital resource use by expired Medicare beneficiaries with chronic illnesses. By analyzing only expired patients, these studies cannot identify differences across hospitals in health outcomes like mortality. This study examines the association between mortality and resource use at the hospital level, when all Medicare beneficiaries hospitalized for heart failure are examined. METHODS AND RESULTS: A total of 3999 individuals hospitalized with a principal diagnosis of heart failure at 6 California teaching hospitals between January 1, 2001, and June 30, 2005, were analyzed with multivariate risk-adjustment models for total hospital days, total hospital direct costs, and mortality within 180-days after initial admission ("Looking Forward"). A subset of 1639 individuals who died during the study period were analyzed with multivariate risk-adjustment models for total hospital days and total hospital direct costs within 180-days before death ("Looking Back"). "Looking Forward" risk-adjusted hospital means ranged from 17.0% to 26.0% for mortality, 7.8 to 14.9 days for total hospital days, and 0.66 to 1.30 times the mean value for indexed total direct costs. Spearman rank correlation coefficients were -0.68 between mortality and hospital days, and -0.93 between mortality and indexed total direct costs. "Looking Back" risk-adjusted hospital means ranged from 9.1 to 21.7 days for total hospital days and 0.91 to 1.79 times the mean value for indexed total direct costs. Variation in resource use site ranks between expired and all individuals were attributable to insignificant differences. CONCLUSIONS: California teaching hospitals that used more resources caring for patients hospitalized for heart failure had lower mortality rates. Focusing only on expired individuals may overlook mortality variation as well as associations between greater resource use and lower mortality. Reporting values without identifying significant differences may result in incorrect assumption of true differences.
Ong et al. (Wed,) conducted a cohort in heart failure (n=3,999). Hospital resource use was evaluated on Association between mortality and resource use (total hospital days and direct costs) within 180 days (Spearman r -0.68 and -0.93). Higher hospital resource use was associated with lower 180-day mortality among heart failure patients, with Spearman correlations of -0.68 for hospital days and -0.93 for direct costs.