Mudgee District Hospital has a “higher than expected” mortality rate for pneumonia and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, according to one of two new reports issued by the Bureau of Health Information (BHI) last week.
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The Exploring clinical variation in mortality report includes new data on deaths within 30 days of patients being admitted to NSW hospitals between July 2012 and June 2015.
It covers the acute conditions of heart attack, ischaemic stroke, haemorrhagic stroke, congestive heart failure, pneumonia, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and hip fracture surgery.
The BHI reports that together they comprise 10 per cent of all hospital admissions and 30 per cent of all deaths in public hospitals.
BHI chief executive, Dr Jean-Frederic Levesque, said the report analysed mortality rates and assessed if they were lower, higher or as expected, given the age and health conditions of patients in 75 hospitals.
Mudgee District Hospital scored “no different than expected” for five of the seven conditions.
But there was a “higher than expected” mortality rate among the people who suffered pneumonia and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.
Pneumonia which had the highest number of patients of the categories at 599.
Dr Levesque said there had been substantial improvement in 30-day mortality rates for all conditions in NSW across 15 years, including a 41 per cent decrease in mortality rates for patients admitted to hospital because of a heart attack.
“Most recently, there has been a marked 11 per cent decrease in mortality rates among patients hospitalised for ischaemic stroke,” he said.
The other report, Exploring clinical variation in readmission, revealed Mudgee District Hospital also had “higher than expected readmission” within 30 days for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease between July 2012 and June 2015.
The hospital scored “no different than expected” for the five other conditions and two elective surgeries.
They are heart attack, ischaemic stroke, congestive heat failure, pneumonia, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, total hip replacement and total knee replacement.
Dr Levesque said, “in general, patients who had longer stays in hospital were more likely to be readmitted, particularly those treated for pneumonia and total knee replacement.”
The reports and profiles for the 79 NSW public hospitals are at bhi.nsw.gov.au