ArticleBMC health services research2017
Assessing the impact of the introduction of an electronic hospital discharge system on the completeness and timeliness of discharge communication: a before and after study.
Article in BMC health services research, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 14 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
14 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- A systematic literature review and narrative synthesis on the risks of medical discharge letters for patients' safety.BMC health services research · 2019Pooled it
- Development and validation of the Patient Involvement in Medication Communication at Hospital discharge Questionnaire (PIMCH-Q).Journal of patient-reported outcomes · 2026Article
- Digitally Enabled Discharge Quality After Neurosurgical Traumatic Brain Injury: A 10-Year Cohort from a Brazilian Public Tertiary Center.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Article
- Design and Implementation of an Electronic Patient Record via Adaptation of Existing Hospital Software.Cureus · 2025Article
- Article
- Transition of care in stroke patients discharged home: a single-center prospective cohort study.BMC health services research · 2021Article
- Evaluation is Key: Providing Appropriate Evaluation Measures for Participatory and User-Centred Design Processes of Healthcare IT.International journal of integrated care · 2021Article
- What makes a "successful" or "unsuccessful" discharge letter? Hospital clinician and General Practitioner assessments of the quality of discharge letters.BMC health services research · 2021Article
- Effectiveness of an Electronic Communication Tool on Transitions in Care From the Intensive Care Unit: Protocol for a Cluster-Specific Pre-Post Trial.JMIR research protocols · 2021Article
- Assessing the impact of a quality improvement program on the quality and timeliness of discharge documents: A before and after study.Medicine · 2020Article
- The Patient-Held Active Record of Medication Status (PHARMS) study: a mixed-methods feasibility analysis.The British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners · 2019Article
- Processing discharge summaries in general practice: a qualitative interview study with GPs and practice managers.BJGP open · 2019Article
- Communication with general practitioners: a survey of spinal cord injury physicians' perspectives.Spinal cord series and cases · 2019Article
- The impact of delayed paper communication to primary care from secondary care and out of hours services.London journal of primary care · 2018Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
8 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundHospital discharge summaries are a key communication tool ensuring continuity of care between primary and secondary care. Incomplete or untimely communication of information increases risk of hospital readmission and associated complications. The aim of this study was to evaluate whether the introduction of a new electronic discharge system (NewEDS) was associated with improvements in the completeness and timeliness of discharge information, in Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust, England.
methodsA before and after longitudinal study design was used. Data were collected using the gold standard auditing tool from the Royal College of Physicians (RCP). This tool contains a checklist of 57 items grouped into seven categories, 28 of which are classified as mandatory by RCP. Percentage completeness (out of the 28 mandatory items) was considered to be the primary outcome measure. Data from 773 patients discharged directly from the acute medical unit over eight-week long time periods (four before and four after the change to the NewEDS) from August 2010 to May 2012 were extracted and evaluated. Results were summarised by effect size on completeness before and after changeover to NewEDS respectively. The primary outcome variable was represented with percentage of completeness score and a non-parametric technique was used to compare pre-NewEDS and post-NewEDS scores.
resultsThe changeover to the NewEDS resulted in an increased completeness of discharge summaries from 60.7% to 75.0% (p < 0.001) and the proportion of summaries created under 24 h from discharge increased significantly from 78.0% to 93.0% (p < 0.001). Furthermore, five of the seven grouped checklist categories also showed significant improvements in levels of completeness (p < 0.001), although there were reduced levels of completeness for three items (p < 0.001).
conclusionThe introduction of a NewEDS was associated with a significant improvement in the completeness and timeliness of hospital discharge communication.
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