Unplanned Readmissions to Hospital: GPS' Views Compared with Hospital Staff

ritro UDS substantially over the last three decades. It has been argued that this is the price for shorter hospital stays. Previous studies have attempted to determine the factors which can contribute to unplanned readmissions but the views of General Practitioners (GPs) have not been extensively studied. We compared GPs' views on the causes of unplanned readmissions with those of hospital staff. Methods: 124 patients [aged z 65 years] who were readmitted (unplanned) within 28 days of being discharged from an integrated medical service were identified from the PAS dataoase. Using a structured questionnaire a trained researcher determined the views of hospital staff (senior nurse/doctor) caring for the patient on causes of the readmission. The same questionnaire was sent to the patients' GPs. The views of hospital staff and GPs were compared by the McNemar's test. Results: Crude readmission rate = 13.2% GP response rate = 65% Complete data were available on 84 subjects. [ * = p < 0.05] Readmission Factors