According to a study of more than 10 million patient records, hospitals that receive high safety scores and score high on external safety measures do not provide better care for patients of color than establishments are rated lower.
Research from Leapfrog Group and Urban Institute, using 2019 hospital discharge data from across 15 states, found that Black and Latino patients were more likely to experience safety adverse events than patients white patients, regardless of the Hospital’s rating in the Leapfrog Group.
Twice a year, the Leapfrog Group assigns safety ratings to hospitals nationwide based on their self-reported safety performance and adverse events such as medication errors, infections and complications. surgical symptom. The supervisory institution’s score is considered a reputable indicator of the quality and safety of the hospital for potential patients.
The study found that across all hospitals, Black and Latino patients had 34% higher rates of postoperative sepsis than white patients, and Black patients had a higher rate of dangerous blood clots. 51% higher due to surgery-related complications.
The findings point to the need for greater scrutiny of the intersection between patient safety and inequality of care.
“This appears to be a symptom of structured racism in diseases,” said Anuj Gangopadhyaya, report author and senior research associate at the Urban Institute’s health policy center. institute. “If we have the ability to improve the overall score, then we should be able to reduce the disparities between patient groups in our facilities.”
Instead of being satisfied with their performance on external quality and safety measures, hospitals need to re-evaluate and update policies and programs to better address disparities, said Gangopadhyaya. on quality results. “When a hospital becomes ‘higher quality’ you would expect disparities to drop evenly across all patient groups, and that’s not the case here,” he said.
All patients had a lower risk of falls, infections, and pressure ulcers in hospitals rated “A” than in hospitals rated “C”, “D” or “F”. However, Black and Latino patients are not as safe as white patients in higher-rated facilities.
The study showed greater disparities between Black and Caucasian patients in rates of sepsis, bleeding, and other surgery-related adverse events at Leapfrog’s “A” hospitals.
At “A” hospitals, the rate of perioperative bleeding in Caucasians was 2.01 cases per 1,000 discharges at risk, compared with 2.80 cases in Black patients. The rate of perioperative pulmonary embolism or deep vein thrombosis was 2.87 cases and 4.22 cases, respectively.
