Hospitals Improve Survival Rates While Treating Sicker Patients Thomson Healthcare S...( EVANSTON Ill. Sept. 11 /- Surviva...),Health

EVANSTON, Ill., Sept. 11 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Survival rates for U.S. hospital inpatients have improved since 1998, despite predictions that rates would worsen due to the increased severity of the illnesses being treated, according to a study by Thomson Healthcare's Center for Healthcare Improvement (NYSE: TOC; TSX: TOC).

According to "Improvements in Hospital Inpatient Survival Rates, 1998- 2006," advances in care realized by U.S. hospitals since 1998 translated into the survival of 350,000 more patients than expected in 2006. (To request the report, visit http://www.solucient.com)

The study also showed that hospitals are treating sicker patients. To analyze this, discharge data and diagnoses codes were used to model expected survival rates which were compared to actual survival rates. Several earlier studies suggested that severity of illness, also called acuity, was rising among select patient groups; the Center for Healthcare Improvement (CHI) study confirmed this trend for all inpatients.

"The good news is that more patients are surviving; the better news is that even more patients than expected are surviving," said Kaveh Safavi, M.D., J.D., chief medical officer, Center for Healthcare Improvement and one of the study's co-authors. "The findings indicate significant progress in improving patient safety, as measured by survival rates, even though the nation's hospitals are facing the challenge of serving a higher percentage of inpatients with illnesses of increased severity."

Improving hospital patient safety has been the focus of a number of initiatives since 1998. For example, the goal of the 100,000 Lives Campaign, conducted by the
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