Work

Variability of hospital resources for acute care of COPD patients: the European COPD Audit

Year: 2013

Type: article

Abstract: Studies have suggested that larger hospitals have better resources and provide better care than smaller ones. This study aimed to explore the relationship between hospital size, resources, organisation of care and adherence to guidelines. The European COPD Audit was designed as a pilot study of clinical care and a survey of resources and organisation of care. Data were entered by clinicians to a multilingual web tool and analysed centrally. Participating hospitals were divided into tertiles on the basis of bed numbers and comparisons made of the resources, organisation of care and adherence to guidelines across the three size groups. 13 national societies provided data on 425 hospitals. The mean number of beds per tertile was 220 (lower), 479 (middle), and 989 (upper). Large hospitals were more likely to have resources and increased numbers of staff; hospital performance measures were related in a minority of indicators only. Adherence to guidelines also varied with hospital size, but the differences were small and inconsistent. There is a wide variation in the size, resources and organisation of care across Europe for hospitals providing chronic obstructive pulmonary disease care. While larger hospitals have more resources, this does not always equate to better accessibility or quality of care for patients.

Source: European Respiratory Journal

DOI: 10.1183/09031936.00074413

Authors: Jose Luis López-Campos, Sylvia Hartl, Francisco Pozo-Rodriguez, C. Michael Roberts