Correlation between the ratio of physician consultation fees to hourly minimum wage and consultation length: a cross-sectional study of nine countries.

OBJECTIVES: Current healthcare reimbursement system is criticised for not adequately compensating physicians' cognitive services. This study was performed to examine primary care physicians' consultation fees in nine countries, relative to the national hourly minimum wage and to examine the correlations of the physician consultation fee with consultation length and other healthcare indices. DESIGN AND OUTCOME MEASURES: Nine reference countries for which healthcare statistics are publicly available and outpatient consultation is compensated by fee-for-service payment were selected. A representative consultation fee was chosen to calculate the ratio of the consultation fee to the hourly minimum wage. The primary outcome was the correlation between the consultation fee/hourly minimum wage ratio and consultation length. In addition, the consultation fees were compared with fees for haemoglobin A1c tests and brain imaging. Pearson's method was primarily used for correlation analysis. RESULTS: The mean representative consultation fee/hourly minimum wage ratio was 4.02 (median, 2.7; range, 0.80-10.36). The mean consultation length was 12.9 min (median, 14.7 min; range, 5-21.1 min). A significant correlation (r=0.79) was found between consultation length and the consultation fee/hourly minimum wage ratio. The ratio of consultation fee to hourly minimum wage was moderately negatively correlated with the annual number of physician visits, number of consultations per doctor and length of hospital stay. The brain CT fee/consultation fee ratio was moderately positively correlated with the number of CT units per 1 million population. In Japan and Korea, where the brain CT/consultation fee ratio was highest, the number of CT examinations per population was also highest. CONCLUSIONS: The relationship of consultation fees to each country's hourly minimum wage varied in nine reference countries; however, it was strongly correlated with consultation length. The imbalance in compensation for cognitive services might drive increased use of imaging tests in some countries.

D-dimer predicts poor hospitalisation outcomes in patients with antineutrophil cytoplasmic autoantibody-associated vasculitis.

OBJECTIVES: The in-hospital mortality rate among patients with antineutrophil cytoplasmic autoantibody-associated vasculitis (AAV) is high. Unfortunately, there is no reliable prognostic biomarker. This study aimed to investigate whether elevated D-dimer levels can predict hospitalisation outcomes among patients with AAV. METHODS: We performed a retrospective analysis at a tertiary medical centre in Seoul, South Korea, between 2005 and 2019. Patients with AAV requiring hospitalisation, whose D-dimer levels were available within one week of hospitalisation, were included; patients with known alternative reasons for elevated D-dimer were excluded. Death and intensive care unit requirements were defined as adverse outcomes. RESULTS: In total, 61 AAV patients with a total of 100 episodes of hospitalisation were included. Median D-dimer levels were significantly higher in patients with adverse outcomes than in those without adverse outcomes (1.84 vs. 0.42 mg/dL; p=0.006). Consistently, the incidence of the adverse outcomes was significantly higher in the high D-dimer group (≥0.699 mg/dL; n = 40) than in the low D-dimer group (<0.699 mg/dL; n = 60) (35% vs. 10%; p=0.002). Multivariate logistic regression analysis revealed that a high D-dimer level was a significant risk factor for adverse outcomes (hazard ratio, 4.852; 95% confidence interval, 1.320-17.833; p=0.017). Kaplan-Meier survival analysis revealed that the high D-dimer group was associated with more 30-day in-hospital adverse outcomes than the low D-dimer group (p=0.008). CONCLUSIONS: High D-dimer levels on admission are significantly associated with adverse outcomes among patients with AAV.

Fever as an initial manifestation of spondyloarthritis: A retrospective study.

OBJECTIVES: We aimed to evaluate a wide spectrum of clinical features of adult patients with spondyloarthritis (SpA) whose initial manifestation was fever, using the Assessment of SpondyloArthritis international Society (ASAS) classification criteria. METHODS: We retrospectively collected the electronic medical records of hospitalized SpA patients who initially presented to the Severance Hospital (Seoul, Korea) with fever from January 2010 to May 2016. As a control group, we also recruited one-hundred consecutive patients who were diagnosed with SpA in our outpatient clinic. Clinical features and laboratory findings were compared in two patient groups. RESULTS: There were 26 patients who had fever as initial presentation of SpA (reactive arthritis 50%, undifferentiated SpA 26.9%, ankylosing spondylitis 15.4%, enteropathic arthritis 3.8%, psoriatic arthritis 3.8%). Peripheral SpA was more common in febrile SpA patients than in control SpA patients (65.4% vs 24.0%, p<0.001). Febrile SpA patients were less frequently HLA-B27 positive than control SpA patients (52.2% vs 77.0%, p<0.05). At baseline, systemic inflammatory markers were significantly higher in the febrile SpA patients (white blood cell count, 11.57 vs 7.81 cells/µL, p<0.001; erythrocyte sedimentation rate, 69.2 vs 41.0 mm/h, p<0.001; C-reactive protein, 109.6 vs 15.3 mg/L, p<0.001). The proportion of patients treated with systemic steroids was significantly higher in febrile SpA patients (57.7% vs. 11.0%, p<0.001). The proportion of patients who visited rheumatology specialty was significantly lower in febrile SpA patients than in control SpA patients (7.7% vs 59.0%, p<0.001). CONCLUSION: Various subgroups of SpA can be presented with fever as an initial manifestation. Febrile SpA patients demonstrated higher systemic inflammation and a lower chance to visit rheumatology in early stage. When evaluating febrile patients with any clinical features of SpA, clinicians are advised to consider performing SpA-focused evaluation including HLA-B27 or a simple sacroiliac joint radiograph.

Right Ventricular Myocardial Infarction due to Right Coronary Artery Total Occlusion Originating From the Distal Left Circumflex Artery.

An isolated single coronary artery is rare but often associated with other congenital cardiac malformations and myocardial ischemia. We report a rare case of right ventricular myocardial infarction due to total occlusion of the right coronary artery originating from the distal left circumflex artery.