Giving readmission numbers a BOOST.

BACKGROUND: In February 2010, a medium-sized teaching hospital in the upper Midwest implemented project BOOST. Better Outcomes for Older adults through Safe Transitions (BOOST) is a program through the Society of Hospital Medicine to improve care around discharge of elderly adults. METHODS: We analyzed the 30-day readmission rate for nearly all unplanned readmissions to our hospital retrospectively for the 12 months before and after the implementation of BOOST. RESULTS: The results of our investigation included a reduction in 30-day readmission rates from 4 percent to 3.7 percent. This was statistically significant (95 percent confidence) and prevented an estimated 119 repeat admissions. Interestingly, the most significant of these decreases was noted in the patient population not directly cared for by the hospitalist service (who planned and implemented project BOOST), but whom the same case managers discharged. CONCLUSIONS: Project BOOST, implemented by case managers, resulted in a statistically significant decrease in readmissions in 30 days for all patients regardless of treating specialty or reason for admission.

Interspecies signaling between Veillonella atypica and Streptococcus gordonii requires the transcription factor CcpA.

Streptococcus gordonii and Veillonella atypica, two early-colonizing members of the dental plaque biofilm, participate in a relationship that results in increased transcription of the S. gordonii gene amyB, encoding an alpha-amylase. We show that the transcription factor CcpA is required for this interspecies interaction.