Publications by authors named "Anita G Au"
Background: Urinary tract infections (UTI) are one of the most common hospital-acquired infections with 80% as a result of urinary catheterisation.
Aim/objective: This study examined the impact of a simple intervention consisting of a daily chart reminder in patients with indwelling urinary catheters (IUC) on the duration of catheter use and the incidence of catheter-associated UTIs (CAUTIs).
Methods: The trial used a prospective pretest-post-test design with a control group over a six-month period conducted on two medical units of a community teaching hospital.
Purpose: Patient care quality appears to be similar when delivered by trainee and attending physicians. The authors conducted a systematic review and meta-analysis to examine whether outcomes differ for general internal medicine (GIM) patients admitted to teaching versus nonteaching services.
Method: The authors searched Medline, EMBASE, and Cochrane Library databases in May 2012 to identify peer-reviewed, English-language studies with contemporaneous controls comparing inpatient mortality, 30-day readmission rate, and/or length of stay (LOS) for inpatients admitted to teaching or nonteaching GIM services.
Background: It is unclear whether teaching status or day of discharge influences outcomes after a heart failure hospitalization.
Methods And Results: We evaluated adults discharged after a heart failure hospitalization between 1999 and 2009 in Alberta, Canada. The primary outcome was death or nonelective readmission 30 days postdischarge.
Background: The accuracy of current models to predict the risk of unplanned readmission or death after a heart failure (HF) hospitalization is uncertain.
Methods: We linked four administrative databases in Alberta to identify all adults discharged alive after a HF hospitalization between April 1999 and 2009. We randomly selected one episode of care per patient and evaluated the accuracy of five administrative data-based models (4 already published, 1 new) for predicting risk of death or unplanned readmission within 30 days of discharge.
Background: Although studies have demonstrated excess risk of ischemic events if aspirin is withheld preoperatively, it is unclear whether preoperative thienopyridine use influences postoperative outcomes.
Methods: We conducted a systematic review of 37 studies (31 cardiac and 6 noncardiac surgery, 3 randomized, 34 observational) comparing postoperative outcomes in patients who were versus were not exposed to thienopyridine in the 5 days before surgery.
Results: Exposure to thienopyridine in the 5 days preceding surgery (compared with no exposure) was not associated with any reduction in postoperative myocardial infarction (23 studies, 12,872 patients, 3.