Identifying low-risk pneumonia patients can avert unnecessary, costly hospital admissions.
New scoring system cuts costly pneumonia admissions. Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston recently completed a test-run of an innovative prediction rule scoring system that enables emergency physicians to determine if patients with pneumonia are at low risk for death. The information gleaned from the scoring system is helping physicians determine if patients can be sent home with confidence and antibiotics, instead of admitting them to the hospital.
D000328:Adult; D017714:Community-Acquired Infections / Q000191:economics / Q000503:physiopathology; D003955:Diagnostic Tests, Routine; D004638:Emergency Treatment; D006801:Humans; D010343:Patient Admission / Q000191:economics / Q000592:standards*; D011014:Pneumonia / Q000191:economics* / Q000503:physiopathology*; D017410:Practice Guidelines as Topic; D011379:Prognosis; D012307:Risk Factors; D016896:Treatment Outcome; D014481:United States; D016270:United States Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality