Time to surgery and rehabilitation resources affect outcomes in orthogeriatric units.

Objective: To compare the pathways of care and clinical results for patients admitted for hip fracture (HF) in 3 orthogeriatric co-managed care centers in order to estimate the effect of system factors on mortality and functional outcome.

Design: Prospective inception multicenter cohort study.

Setting: Three tertiary Hospitals.

Participants: 806 patients consecutively admitted with HF.

Measurements: 1-Year mortality, the loss of 1 or more functional abilities in activities of daily living (ADLs), and the recovery/maintenance of independent ambulation at 6 months from the fracture.

Results: On the whole sample, 71.1% of patients survived 1 year from the fracture. In one hospital the risk of 1-year mortality was significantly higher even after adjusting for age, sex, comorbidity, prefracture functional status and cognitive impairment (odd ratio (OR) 1.56, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.15-2.18, p=0.01). This was principally explained by a longer time to surgery (5.2 days ± 3.2 vs 2.7 ± 2.3 and 2.7 ± 2.2, p<0.001). The three hospitals also differed in the rate of subjects losing the ability in ADLs after 6 months from the fracture (54.2%, 61%, 43.5%, p=0.016), while no statistical differences were found in the recovery of independent ambulation. On the basis of multivariate models, a lower access to post-acute rehabilitation could account for lower outcome in functional status.

Conclusions: This study suggests that system factors such as time to surgery and rehabilitation resources can affect functional recovery and 1-year mortality in orthogeriatric units and they could explain different outcomes when comparing care models.