Causes and Timing of Unplanned Early Readmission After Neurosurgery.

Background: Reducing the rate of 30-day hospital readmission has become a priority in healthcare quality improvement policy, with a focus on better characterizing the reasons for unplanned readmission. In neurosurgery, however, peer-reviewed analyses describing the patterns of readmission have been limited in their number and generalizability.

Objective: To determine the incidence, timing, and causes of 30-day readmission after neurosurgical procedures.

The Correlation of Media Ranking's "Best" Hospitals and Surgical Outcomes Following Radical Cystectomy for Urothelial Cancer.

Objective: To evaluate whether there is a correlation between publicized health ranking systems and surgical outcomes after radical cystectomy (RC) in New York State (NYS).

Materials And Methods: Using the Statewide Planning and Research Cooperative System, data were collected in an aggregated fashion per hospital for the 20 hospitals with the highest RC volume in NYS from 2009 to 2012. Hospital characteristics were obtained from the publicly available sources such as the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

Patterns of care for readmission after radical cystectomy in New York State and the effect of care fragmentation.

Objective: To determine if readmission after radical cystectomy (RC) to the original hospital of the procedure (OrH) vs. readmission to a different hospital (DiffH) has an effect on outcomes.

Methods: The New York Statewide Planning and Research Cooperative System database was queried for discharges between January 1, 2009 and November 31, 2012 after RC in New York State.

Variability in outcome after elective cerebral aneurysm repair in high-volume academic medical centers.

Background And Purpose: Unruptured intracranial aneurysm repair is the most commonly performed procedure for the prevention of hemorrhagic stroke. Despite efforts to regionalize care in high-volume centers, overall results have improved little. This study aims to determine the effectiveness in improving outcomes of previous efforts to regionalize unruptured intracranial aneurysm repair to high-volume centers and to recommend future steps toward that goal.

Creating clinical and economic "wins" through integrated case management: lessons for physicians and health system administrators.

The 5% of patients using 50% of health resources commonly have interacting and persistent multimorbid illnesses; concurrent mental health problems; impaired social networks; and/or difficulties in accessing care through the health system. To improve outcomes in these patients, it is necessary to overcome clinical and nonclinical barriers that lead to poor health, treatment resistance, high health care cost, and disability. This article describes an innovative complexity-based and outcome-oriented approach using integrated case management.

General medical and pharmacy claims expenditures in users of behavioral health services.

Objective: To quantify the magnitude of general medical and/or pharmacy claims expenditures for individuals who use behavioral health services and to assess future claims when behavioral service use persists.

Design: Retrospective cost trends and 24-month cohort analyses.

Setting: A Midwest health plan.