title: Medical errors related to discontinuity of care from an inpatient to an outpatient setting.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To determine the prevalence of medical errors related to the discontinuity of care from an inpatient to an outpatient setting, and to determine if there is an association between these medical errors and adverse outcomes.
  
  
  METHODS
  Eighty-six patients who had been hospitalized on the medicine service at a large academic medical center and who were subsequently seen by their primary care physicians at the affiliated outpatient practice within 2 months after discharge.
  
  
  METHODS
  Each patient's inpatient and outpatient medical record was reviewed for the presence of 3 types of errors related to the discontinuity of care from the inpatient to the outpatient setting: medication continuity errors, test follow-up errors, and work-up errors.
  
  
  METHODS
  Rehospitalizations within 3 months after the initial postdischarge outpatient primary care visit.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Forty-nine percent of patients experienced at least 1 medical error. Patients with a work-up error were 6.2 times (95%confidence interval [95% CI], 1.3 to 30.3) more likely to be rehospitalized within 3 months after the first outpatient visit. We did not find a statistically significant association between medication continuity errors (odds ratio [OR], 2.5; 95%CI, 0.7 to 8.8) and test follow-up errors (OR, 2.4; 95%CI, 0.3 to 17.1) with rehospitalizations.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  We conclude that the prevalence of medical errors related to the discontinuity of care from the inpatient to the outpatient setting is high and may be associated with an increased risk of rehospitalization.
authors.affiliation: Division of General Internal Medicine, Department of Medicine, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York, NY, USA. carlton.moore@mssm.edu
authors.forename: Carlton
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Moore
authors.forename: Juan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Wisnivesky
authors.forename: Stephen
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Williams
authors.forename: Thomas
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: McGinn
mesh_terms: D000553:Ambulatory Care / Q000592:standards; D003266:Continuity of Patient Care / Q000592:standards*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D019300:Medical Errors; D017063:Outcome Assessment, Health Care / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D010351:Patient Discharge / Q000592:standards*; D010359:Patient Readmission / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D015203:Reproducibility of Results