A Clinical Data Warehouse Analysis of Risk Factors for Inpatient Falls in a Tertiary Hospital: A Case-Control Study.

OBJECTIVES: The aims of the study are to identify fall risk factors and to establish automatic risk assessments based on clinical data from electronic medical records of hospitalized patients. METHODS: In this retrospective case-control study, we reviewed the electronic medical records of 1454 patients (292 and 1162 patients in the fall and nonfall groups, respectively) who were hospitalized at a 1800-bed tertiary hospital in South Korea between January 1, 2017, and December 31, 2017. Patients' age, sex, and clinical department were matched, and all laboratory reports, clinical flow sheets, and nursing initial assessment records of case from the Clinical Data Warehouse system were analyzed. The collated patient records data were analyzed using SAS (version 9.4) and logistic regression. RESULTS: Overall, 65 risk factors, including low body mass index, low blood pressure, low albumin levels, high fasting blood sugar level, low red blood cell counts, and high potassium levels, that significantly increased the incidence of falls were identified. Falls were also associated with 21 items from the clinical flow sheet and nursing initial assessment, including frequent bowel movements, 24-hour urine tests, imaging tests, biopsy, pain, intravenous tubes, unclear consciousness, and taking medication. CONCLUSIONS: Fall risk factors identified via the Clinical Data Warehouse can be used to build an automated detection system to detect fall risk in electronic medical records, enabling nurses to assess the fall risk in addition to using the fall scale.

A comparative study on patient safety attitude between nurses and doctors in operating rooms.

OBJECTIVE: To investigate and compare the attitudes of operating room nurses and doctors regarding patient safety, performance of surgical time-out and recognition of count error. METHODS: This cross-sectional study recruited operating room nurses, surgeons and anaesthesiologists between 1 August 2015 and 5 February 2016. A Safety Attitude Questionnaire was used to analyse the three elements in both groups of operating room staff (nurses and doctors). RESULTS: The study analysed the questionnaires from 171 participants; 95 nurses (55.6%) and 76 doctors (44.4%). Differences exist between doctors and nurses regarding teamwork climate, working conditions, perception of management and the recognition of stress. On the performance of surgical time-out, nurses showed higher scores on way of counting, while doctors showed higher scores on the time-out procedure itself. Also, doctors believed they actively cooperated with the nurses, while nurses believed they did not receive cooperation. Scores for the recognition of count error were higher in nurses than in doctors. More experienced operating room staff showed higher scores than younger less experienced staff. CONCLUSIONS: Perceptual differences among doctors and nurses need to be minimized for the safety of the patient in the operating room.

Case-control Study on Risk Factors of Unplanned Extubation Based on Patient Safety Model in Critically Ill Patients with Mechanical Ventilation.

PURPOSE: This study aimed to identify risk factors of unplanned extubation in intensive care unit (ICU) patients with mechanical ventilation using a patient safety model. METHODS: This study was designed to be a case-control study. Data collection sheets, including 29 risk factors of unplanned extubation in mechanically ventilation patients were retrospectively collected based on a patient safety model over 3 years. From 41,207 mechanically ventilated patients, 230 patients were identified to have unplanned extubation during their ICU stay. Based on the characteristics of the cohort of 230 patients who had unplanned extubation, 460 case control comparison groups with planned extubation were selected by matching age, gender and diagnosis. RESULTS: Risk factors of unplanned extubation were categorized as people, technologies, tasks, environmental factors and organizational factors, by five components of the patient safety model. The results showed the risk factors of unplanned extubation as admission route [odds ratio (OR) = 1.8], Glasgow Coma Scale-motor (OR = 1.3), Acute Physiology and Chronic Health Evaluation score (OR = 1.06), agitation (OR = 9.0), delirium (OR = 11.6), mode of mechanical ventilation (OR = 3.0-4.1) and night shifts (OR = 6.0). The significant differences were found between the unplanned and the planned extubation groups on the number of reintubation (4.3% vs. 79.6%, p < .001), ICU outcome at the time of discharge (χ2 = 50.7, p < .001), and length of stay in the ICU (27.0 ± 33.0 vs. 43.8 ± 43.5) after unplanned extubation. CONCLUSION: ICU nurses should be able to recognize the risk factors of unplanned extubation related with the components of the safety model so as to improve patient safety by minimizing the risk for unplanned extubation.