The characteristics of patients frequently admitted to academic medical centers in the United States.

Background: The recent intense attention to hospital readmissions and their implications for quality, safety, and reimbursement necessitates understanding specific subsets of readmitted patients. Frequently admitted patients, defined as patients who are admitted 5 or more times within 1 year, may have some distinguishing characteristics that require novel solutions.

Methods: A comprehensive administrative database (University HealthSystem Consortium's Clinical Data Base/Resource Manager) was analyzed to identify demographic, social, and clinical characteristics of frequently admitted patients in 101 US academic medical centers.

Incidence of hospital-acquired venous thromboembolic codes in medical patients hospitalized in academic medical centers.

Background: Hospital-acquired venous thromboembolism (HA-VTE, VTE occurring during a hospitalization) codes in hospital billing data are often used as a surrogate for hospital-associated VTE events occurring during or up to 30 days after a hospitalization, which are more difficult to measure.

Objective: Establish the incidence and composition of HA-VTE/superficial venous thrombosis (SVT) coded in a large cohort of medical patients.

Design: Retrospective analysis of discharges.

Improved coding of postoperative deep vein thrombosis and pulmonary embolism in administrative data (AHRQ Patient Safety Indicator 12) after introduction of new ICD-9-CM diagnosis codes.

Background: Symptomatic venous thromboembolism is a common postoperative complication. The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) has developed a Patient Safety Indicator 12 to assist hospitals, payers, and other stakeholders to identify patients who experienced this complication.

Objectives: To determine whether newly created and recently redefined ICD-9-CM codes improved the criterion validity of Patient Safety Indicator 12, based on new samples of records dated after October 2009.

Mechanical and suboptimal pharmacologic prophylaxis and delayed mobilization but not morbid obesity are associated with venous thromboembolism after total knee arthroplasty: a case-control study.

Background: The FDA-approved dose of low-molecular-weight heparin (LMWH) may not provide adequate thromboprophylaxis in morbidly obese patients after total knee arthroplasty (TKA). Suboptimal dosing, delayed initiation, and overreliance on mechanical methods may also limit the effectiveness of thromboprophylaxis.

Objective: We explored the associations between the type of thromboprophylaxis, obesity, time of mobilization, and undergoing bilateral TKA on development of symptomatic venous thromboembolism (VTE) after TKA.