title: The immediate impact of opening an adult high dependency unit on intensive care unit occupancy.
abstract: We assessed the hourly occupancy of our intensive care and high dependency units over an 8-week period commencing on the day our high dependency unit opened. Using criteria established by the working group on 'Guidelines on Admission to and Discharge from Intensive Care and High Dependency Units' published by the National Health Service Executive, we defined each patient daily as intensive care or high dependency status. Compared with hourly occupancy figures obtained before the high dependency unit opened, occupancy of the intensive care unit by high dependency patients has been shown to decrease significantly from 21.6% to 11.2%. Use of intensive care beds became more appropriate, their occupancy increasing significantly from 63.7% to 73.4%. A significant decrease in readmissions occurred, supporting the hypothesis that having high dependency beds reduces the number of patients discharged prematurely to the wards.
authors.affiliation: Department of Anaesthesia, Leicester General Hospital NHS Trust, UK.
authors.forename: A J
authors.initials: AJ
authors.lastname: Fox
authors.forename: O
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Owen-Smith
authors.forename: P
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Spiers
mesh_terms: D018806:APACHE; D000328:Adult; D001509:Bed Occupancy; D004739:England; D006801:Humans; D007362:Intensive Care Units / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D010359:Patient Readmission / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D011446:Prospective Studies; D012720:Severity of Illness Index