Study of Physician Awareness of and Communication About Patient Readmissions to the Hospital

Physician Awareness of and Communication About Hospital Readmissions

Patients admitted to inpatient medicine services often require early hospital readmission, and often they are readmitted to different physician or team, potentially without the knowledge of the prior physician or team. Thus, physicians may lose the opportunity to share valuable information about readmitted patients, which may be detrimental to continuity of care and patient safety. The purpose of this study is to determine baseline awareness and communication rates among physicians regarding readmissions, and then measure the effect of automatic notification on these rates.

Inclusion Criteria:

• All patients admitted to the general medicine service at two academic medical centers, and unexpectedly readmitted within 14 days.

Exclusion Criteria:

• Patients readmitted to the same physician(s), or those whose readmission was planned