10
PATIENT
SAFETY
C
ritical access hospitals across the country are
performing more joint replacement surgeries
now than in the past — the surgeries per-
formed at critical access hospitals covered by Medi-
care rose 42.6 percent from 2008 to 2013 — which
can be problematic for patient safety, according to
e Wall Street Journal.
When surgeons or hospitals host a low volume of
certain procedures, patients are at higher risk of suf-
fering death or serious complications, previous anal-
ysis has found. e average critical access hospital
hosted just 26 joint replacement surgeries in 2013,
the Wall Street Journal found, meaning patients there
are at greater risk than if they had a joint procedure
in a general hospital.
Indeed, the Journal and Harvard researchers
found mortality rate for inpatient joint replacements
was roughly nine per 1,000 at critical access hospi-
tals, compared to five per 1,000 at general hospitals.
Critical access hospitals are upping the volume
of elective joint replacements for a number of rea-
sons, including the payment structure they have
with CMS, hiring new surgeons or as the result of a
merger.
"Experts say that as the hospitals' experience
grows, patients' outcomes should improve," accord-
ing to the Journal. "But so far, mortality rates have
held fast." n
Joint Replacement Surgeries on the Rise in
Rural Hospitals: Is it a Patient Safety Issue?
By Heather Punke
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