Bookmark & Share

Favorites	Google
Digg	Del.icio.us
Twitter	Facebook

>> More...

A study published in the September issue of the Archives of Surgery suggests that a three-part patient-census management strategy implemented in June 2008 during Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center's move to a new facility may serve as a model for large-scale disaster inpatient surge capacity planning, MedPage Today reports. To evaluate surge capacity planning, UCLA researchers assessed hospital operations for one-week periods beginning two weeks prior to UCLA Medical Center's relocation. The researchers also analyzed regional hospital and emergency department (ED) capacity. By restricting elective surgeries, limiting incoming transfers and using a multidisciplinary team to plan and manage discharges, UCLA Medical Center reduced capacity with no interruption to ED or trauma services or increased mortality. Specifically, the strategies reduced operative volume by 45 percent and decreased admissions by 42 percent, resulting in a 36 percent reduction in capacity from 537 patients at baseline to 345 on moving day. Noting that the strategy "produced a safe and potentially rapid reduction in hospital census without interruption of [ED] or trauma services," the researchers suggest that hospitals "create an internal plan using these principles of census management with modifications to reflect" regional characteristics. Adding that many facilities are operating at capacity, the researchers call for "a regional and integrated systems approach to surge capacity creation" (Bankhead, MedPage Today, 9/21/09 [registration required]; UCLA release, 9/21/90; Jen et al., Archives of Surgery, September 2009 [subscription required]).