6 Hospital admissions due to an adverse event: an economic burden?
Magdelijns, F.J.H., Pijpers, E., Stassen, P.M.
Locatie(s): Zaal 0.2/0.3
Categorie(ën): Parallelsessie
Background: Health care related adverse events are an important problem in medicine. Apart from medical consequences for the patient, the economic burden is substantial. The information available on costs caused by adverse events is limited to costs of adverse events occurring during hospitalisation. Information on costs of adverse events leading to hospitalization is however limited and focuses on adverse drug events.
Aim: The aim of our study is to provide insight in costs of hospital admissions due to (preventable) health care related adverse events.
Methods: All patients who were admitted via the emergency department to an internal medicine department because of a health care related adverse event (during a 5 month period) were included. We retrospectively retrieved all information from the admission charts. The costs of the admissions were evaluated by adding up the costs of the visit to the emergency department, the inpatient days, the diagnostic tests and the provided treatment. All medical costs were based on hospital invoices.
Results: In total, 324 admissions (in 284 patients) due to a health care related adverse event were included in this study (28.7% of all admissions in a 5 month period). Total costs were calculated to be € 1,396,718. Medication related adverse events were most common (43.5%) and contributed most to the costs (€ 584,399; 41.8% of total costs). Inpatient days proved to be most expensive (€ 1,076,385; 77.3% of total costs). The 90 adverse events that were judged preventable accounted for € 276,180 of total costs (19.8%).
Conclusion: Our study demonstrates that hospitalization due to a health care related adverse event is not only common (28.7%) but also a serious economic burden (€ 1,396,718 in 5 months). Preventable health care related adverse events accounted for 19.8% of these costs.
In conclusion: (preventable) health care related adverse events add substantially to overall healthcare costs. Awareness of our medical actions with their possible adverse events is necessary to reduce our already high health care costs.