Comparison of admission rates among patients treated by male and female emergency physicians: a multicenter study.
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ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Valiuddin H
PROVIDER: S-EPMC7329465 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Jul
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
Publications
Comparison of admission rates among patients treated by male and female emergency physicians: a multicenter study.
Valiuddin Hisham H Ring Hope H Fallon Michelle M Valiuddin Yaser Y
BMC emergency medicine 20200701 1
<h4>Background</h4>No study to date has looked at the gender of emergency medicine (EM) physicians in the United States in relation to admission rates. This study seeks to investigate admission rates of adult patients treated by female vs male EM physicians, to identify whether a practice pattern bias exists.<h4>Methods</h4>This was a multicenter retrospective study of four community hospitals.<h4>Population</h4>All patient encounters between July 1, 2016 and June 30, 2017.<h4>Outcome</h4>We com ...[more]
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Project description:ImportanceStudies have found differences in practice patterns between male and female physicians, with female physicians more likely to adhere to clinical guidelines and evidence-based practice. However, whether patient outcomes differ between male and female physicians is largely unknown.ObjectiveTo determine whether mortality and readmission rates differ between patients treated by male or female physicians.Design, setting, and participantsWe analyzed a 20% random sample of Medicare fee-for-service beneficiaries 65 years or older hospitalized with a medical condition and treated by general internists from January 1, 2011, to December 31, 2014. We examined the association between physician sex and 30-day mortality and readmission rates, adjusted for patient and physician characteristics and hospital fixed effects (effectively comparing female and male physicians within the same hospital). As a sensitivity analysis, we examined only physicians focusing on hospital care (hospitalists), among whom patients are plausibly quasi-randomized to physicians based on the physician's specific work schedules. We also investigated whether differences in patient outcomes varied by specific condition or by underlying severity of illness.Main outcomes and measuresPatients' 30-day mortality and readmission rates.ResultsA total of 1 583 028 hospitalizations were used for analyses of 30-day mortality (mean [SD] patient age, 80.2 [8.5] years; 621 412 men and 961 616 women) and 1 540 797 were used for analyses of readmission (mean [SD] patient age, 80.1 [8.5] years; 602 115 men and 938 682 women). Patients treated by female physicians had lower 30-day mortality (adjusted mortality, 11.07% vs 11.49%; adjusted risk difference, -0.43%; 95% CI, -0.57% to -0.28%; P < .001; number needed to treat to prevent 1 death, 233) and lower 30-day readmissions (adjusted readmissions, 15.02% vs 15.57%; adjusted risk difference, -0.55%; 95% CI, -0.71% to -0.39%; P < .001; number needed to treat to prevent 1 readmission, 182) than patients cared for by male physicians, after accounting for potential confounders. Our findings were unaffected when restricting analyses to patients treated by hospitalists. Differences persisted across 8 common medical conditions and across patients' severity of illness.Conclusions and relevanceElderly hospitalized patients treated by female internists have lower mortality and readmissions compared with those cared for by male internists. These findings suggest that the differences in practice patterns between male and female physicians, as suggested in previous studies, may have important clinical implications for patient outcomes.
| S-EPMC5558155 | biostudies-literature
Project description:IMPORTANCE:Subtle but important differences have been described in the way that male and female physicians care for their patients, with some evidence suggesting women are more likely to adhere to best practice recommendations. OBJECTIVE:To determine if male and female physicians differ in their prescribing practices as measured by the initiation of lower-than-recommended dose cholinesterase inhibitor (ChEI) drug therapy for dementia management. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS:All community-dwelling Ontario residents aged 66 years and older with dementia and newly dispensed an oral ChEI drug (donepezil, galantamine, or rivastigmine) between April 1, 2010 and June 30, 2016 were included. MAIN OUTCOME AND MEASURES:The association between physician sex and the initiation of a lower than recommended-dose ChEI was examined using generalized linear mixed regression models, adjusting for patient and physician characteristics. Data were stratified by specialty. Secondary analyses explored the association between physician sex and cardiac screening as well as shorter duration of the initial prescription. RESULTS:The analysis included 3,443 female and 5,811 male physicians and the majority (83%) were family physicians, Female physicians were more likely to initiate ChEI therapy at a lower-than-recommended dose (Adjusted odds ratio = 1.43,95% confidence interval = 1.17 to 1.74). Compared to their male counterparts, female physicians were also more likely to follow other conservative prescribing practices including cardiac screening (55.1% vs. 49.2%, P-value<0.001) around the time of ChEI initiation, and dispensing a shorter duration of initial prescription (41.8% vs 35.5% P-value<0.001). CONCLUSIONS:There is a statistically significant and important difference in ChEI prescribing patterns between female and male physicians, suggesting that female physicians may be more careful and conservative in their approaches. This will inform future research to determine if patients receiving lower-than-recommended initial doses also have better outcomes.
| S-EPMC6197851 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Professionalism is a critical competency for emergency medicine (EM) physicians, and professional behavior affects patient satisfaction. However, the findings of various studies indicate that there are differences in the interpretation of professionalism among EM resident physicians and faculty physicians. Using a cross-sectional survey, we aimed to analyze common challenges to medical professionalism for Japanese EM physicians and survey the extent of professionalism coursework completed during undergraduate medical education. We conducted a multicenter cross-sectional survey of EM resident physicians and faculty physicians at academic conferences and eight teaching hospitals in Japan using the questionnaire by Barry and colleagues. We analyzed the frequency of providing either the best or second-best answers to each scenario as the main outcome measure and compared the frequencies between EM resident physicians and EM faculty physicians. Fisher's exact test and the Wilcoxon rank sum test were used to analyze data. A total of 176 physicians (86 EM resident physicians and 90 EM faculty physicians) completed the survey. The response rate was 92.6%. The most challenging scenario presented to participants dealt with sexual harassment, and only 44.5% chose the best or second-best answers, followed by poor responses to the confidentiality scenario (69.9%). The frequency of either the best or second-best responses to the confidentiality scenario was significantly greater for EM resident physicians than for EM faculty physicians (77.1% versus 62.9%, p = 0.048). More participants in the EM resident physician group completed formal courses in medical professionalism than those in the EM faculty physician group (25.8% versus 5.5%, p < 0.01). Further, EM faculty physicians were less likely than EM resident physicians to provide acceptable responses in terms of confidentiality, and few of both had received professionalism training through school curricula. Continuous professionalism education focused on the prevention of sexual harassment and gender gap is needed for both EM resident physicians and faculty physicians in Japan.
| S-EPMC7065769 | biostudies-literature
Project description:ImportanceHospitalized medical patients cared for by female physicians may have decreased mortality rates compared with patients of male physicians. However, this association has yet to be assessed outside of the US, and little is known about factors that may explain this difference.ObjectiveTo determine whether mortality, other hospital outcomes, and processes of care differed between the patients cared for by female and male physicians.Design setting and participantsThis retrospective cross-sectional study included patients admitted to general medical wards at 7 hospitals in Ontario, Canada, between April 1, 2010, and October 31, 2017. The association of physician gender with patient outcomes was examined while adjusting for hospital fixed effects, patient characteristics, physician characteristics, and processes of care. All patients were admitted to a general internal medicine service through the emergency department and were cared for by a general internist or family physician-hospitalist. Patients were excluded if length of stay was greater than 30 days or if the attending physician cared for less than 100 hospitalized general medicine patients over the study period. Statistical analyses were performed from October 15, 2020, to May 8, 2021.Main outcomes and measuresIn-hospital mortality, length of stay, intensive care unit admission, 30-day readmissions, and process-of-care measures (blood tests, medications, imaging, endoscopy, and interventional radiology services).ResultsA total of 171 625 hospitalized patients with a median age of 73 years (interquartile range, 56-84 years) were included (84 221 men [49.1%], 87 402 women [50.9%], and 2 patients with unspecified sex). Patients were cared for by 172 attending physicians (54 female physicians [31.4%] and 118 male physicians [68.6%]). In fully adjusted models, female physicians ordered more imaging tests, including computed tomography (adjusted difference, -1.70%; 95% CI, -2.78% to -0.61%; P = .002), magnetic resonance imaging (-0.88%; 95% CI, -1.37% to -0.38%; P = .001), and ultrasonography (-1.90%; 95% CI, -3.21% to -0.59%; P = .005). Patients treated by female physicians had lower in-hospital mortality (2256 of 46 772 patients [4.8%] vs 6452 of 124 853 patients [5.2%]). This difference persisted after adjustment for patient characteristics but was no longer statistically different after adjustment for other physician characteristics (adjusted difference, 0.29%; 95% CI, -0.08% to 0.65%; P = .12). The difference was similar after further adjustment for processes of care.Conclusions and relevanceIn this cross-sectional study of patients admitted to general medical units in Canada, patients cared for by female physicians had lower mortality rates than those treated by male physicians, adjusting for patient characteristics. This finding was nonsignificant after adjustment for other physician characteristics.
| S-EPMC8796959 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Global international trends in female breast cancer incidence have been described previously but no comparable analysis of male breast cancer incidence rates has been conducted. We obtained male and female case and population data using Cancer Incidence in Five Continents (CI5). We calculated age-adjusted, sex-specific incidence rates and female-to-male incidence rate ratios (FMIRRs) and compared trends of such for the period 1988-2002. This analysis included 8,681 male breast cancer cases and 1.14 million female breast cancer cases. The highest male incidence rate was observed in Israel at 1.24 per 100,000 man-years, and the highest female incidence rate was observed in the United States at 90.7 per 100,000 woman-years. The lowest incidence rates for males (0.16) and females (18.0) were observed in Thailand. In general, male breast cancer incidence trends were variable; a minority of countries displayed evidence for an increase. In contrast, female incidence rates have been increasing in a majority of countries. The Pearson correlation coefficient (r) for male and female breast cancer incidence rates by country during 1988-2002 was 0.69. Male breast cancer rates were generally less than 1 per 100,000 man-years, in contrast to the much higher rates of female breast cancer, providing for an overall FMIRR of 122. The differences in both incidence rates and time trends between males and females may reflect sex differences in underlying risk factors, pathogenesis, and/or overdiagnosis. Conversely, the high correlation between male and female breast cancer incidences may indicate that both sexes share some common risk factors for breast cancer.
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Project description:OBJECTIVES:Chronic respiratory diseases exert a global health burden with high health care costs, morbidity, and mortality. The aim of the present study was to investigate the effect of pulmonary rehabilitation (PR) on emergency admission and hospitalization rates of patients with chronic respiratory disease. MATERIALS AND METHODS:In this retrospective cohort study, hospitalization rates and emergency admissions of patients before (December 2014-December 2015) and after PR (January 2015-December 2016) were investigated. Patients with chronic respiratory diseases were included. Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) patients were classified based on the Global Initiative Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease assessment scheme. PR was applied by three physiotherapists over 8 weeks (2 days/week). Data on patient demographics, clinical and anthropometric data, spirometry, exercise capacity, and quality of life before and after PR were acquired. RESULTS:This study evaluated 51 patients, of whom 76% were men. A total of 37 (73%) COPD patients and 14 (27%) non-COPD patients (7 bronchiectasis, 4 interstitial lung disease, and 3 kyphoscoliosis) were included. The patients exhibited significantly improved incremental shuttle walk test (ISWT) and endurance test scores (p<0.05) after PR. Similar to exercise capacity, the patients exhibited significantly improved Modified Medical Research Council (mMRC) score, St. George's Respiratory Questionnaire (SGRQ), anxiety and depression scores (p<0.05) after PR. In COPD patients, differences in pre- and post-PR ISWT, COPD assessment test, mMRC, and SGRQ scores were statistically significant (p=0.001). The number of emergency admissions and hospitalizations significantly decreased after PR (p=0.001; p=0.001). The post-PR FEV1% of COPD significantly increased (p=0.029). CONCLUSION:Pulmonary rehabilitation leads to an increase in exercise capacity as well as improved quality of life, resulting in a decrease in emergency admissions and hospitalization rates. Considering the cost of hospitalization, it is important to add PR to the management of patients with chronic respiratory diseases, in addition to medical therapy.
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Project description:ImportanceA surgical consultation is a critical first step in the care of patients with emergency general surgery conditions. It is unknown if Black Medicare patients and White Medicare patients receive surgical consultations at similar rates when they are admitted from the emergency department.ObjectiveTo determine whether Black Medicare patients have similar rates of surgical consultations when compared with White Medicare patients after being admitted from the emergency department with an emergency general surgery condition.Design, setting, and participantsThis was a retrospective cohort study that took place at US hospitals with an emergency department and used a computational generalization of inverse propensity score weight to create patient populations with similar covariate distributions. Participants were Medicare patients age 65.5 years or older admitted from the emergency department for an emergency general surgery condition between July 1, 2015, and June 30, 2018. The analysis was performed during February 2022. Patients were classified into 1 of 5 emergency general surgery condition categories based on principal diagnosis codes: colorectal, general abdominal, hepatopancreatobiliary, intestinal obstruction, and upper gastrointestinal.ExposuresBlack vs White race.Main outcomes and measuresReceipt of a surgical consultation after admission from the emergency department with an emergency general surgery condition.ResultsA total of 1 686 940 patients were included in the study. Of those included, 214 788 patients were Black (12.7%) and 1 472 152 patients were White (87.3%). After standardizing for medical and diagnostic imaging covariates, Black patients had 14% lower odds of receiving a surgical consultation (odds ratio [OR], 0.86; 95% CI, 0.85-0.87) with a risk difference of -3.17 (95% CI, -3.41 to -2.92). After standardizing for socioeconomic covariates, Black patients remained at an 11% lower odds of receiving a surgical consultation compared with similar White patients (OR, 0.89; 95% CI, 0.88-0.90) with a risk difference of -2.49 (95% CI, -2.75 to -2.23). Additionally, when restricting the analysis to Black patients and White patients who were treated in the same hospitals, Black patients had 8% lower odds of receiving a surgical consultation when compared with White patients (OR, 0.92; 95% CI, 0.90-0.93) with a risk difference of -1.82 (95% CI, -2.18 to -1.46).Conclusions and relevanceIn this study, Black Medicare patients had lower odds of receiving a surgical consultation after being admitted from the emergency department with an emergency general surgery condition when compared with similar White Medicare patients. These disparities in consultation rates cannot be fully attributed to medical comorbidities, insurance status, socioeconomic factors, or individual hospital-level effects.
| S-EPMC9558057 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Objective To examine the effect of surgeon sex on postoperative outcomes of patients undergoing common surgical procedures.Design Population based, retrospective, matched cohort study from 2007 to 2015.Setting Population based cohort of all patients treated in Ontario, Canada.Participants Patients undergoing one of 25 surgical procedures performed by a female surgeon were matched by patient age, patient sex, comorbidity, surgeon volume, surgeon age, and hospital to patients undergoing the same operation by a male surgeon.Interventions Sex of treating surgeon.Main outcome measure The primary outcome was a composite of death, readmission, and complications. We compared outcomes between groups using generalised estimating equations.Results 104?630 patients were treated by 3314 surgeons, 774 female and 2540 male. Before matching, patients treated by female doctors were more likely to be female and younger but had similar comorbidity, income, rurality, and year of surgery. After matching, the groups were comparable. Fewer patients treated by female surgeons died, were readmitted to hospital, or had complications within 30 days (5810 of 52?315, 11.1%, 95% confidence interval 10.9% to 11.4%) than those treated by male surgeons (6046 of 52?315, 11.6%, 11.3% to 11.8%; adjusted odds ratio 0.96, 0.92 to 0.99, P=0.02). Patients treated by female surgeons were less likely to die within 30 days (adjusted odds ratio 0.88; 0.79 to 0.99, P=0.04), but there was no significant difference in readmissions or complications. Stratified analyses by patient, physician, and hospital characteristics did not significant modify the effect of surgeon sex on outcome. A retrospective analysis showed no difference in outcomes by surgeon sex in patients who had emergency surgery, where patients do not usually choose their surgeon.Conclusions After accounting for patient, surgeon, and hospital characteristics, patients treated by female surgeons had a small but statistically significant decrease in 30 day mortality and similar surgical outcomes (length of stay, complications, and readmission), compared with those treated by male surgeons. These findings support the need for further examination of the surgical outcomes and mechanisms related to physicians and the underlying processes and patterns of care to improve mortality, complications, and readmissions for all patients.
| S-EPMC6284261 | biostudies-other
Project description:ObjectiveTo measure the hospital-level variation in admission rates for children receiving treatment of common pediatric illnesses across emergency departments (EDs) in US children's hospitals.MethodsWe performed a multi-center cross sectional study of children presenting to the EDs of 35 pediatric tertiary-care hospitals participating in the Pediatric Health Information System (PHIS). Admission rates were calculated for visits occurring between January 1, 2009, and December 31, 2012, associated with 1 of 7 common conditions, and corrected to adjust for hospital-level severity of illness. Conditions were selected systematically based on frequency of visits and admission rates.ResultsA total of 1288706 ED encounters (13.8% of all encounters) were associated with 1 of the 7 conditions of interest. After adjusting for hospital-level severity, the greatest variation in admission rates was observed for concussion (range 5%-72%), followed by pneumonia (19%-69%), and bronchiolitis (19%-65%). The least variation was found among patients presenting with seizures (7%-37%) and kidney and urinary tract infections (6%-37%). Although variability existed in disease-specific admission rates, certain hospitals had consistently higher, and others consistently lower, admission rates.ConclusionsWe observed greater than threefold variation in severity-adjusted admission rates for common pediatric conditions across US children's hospitals. Although local practices and hospital-level factors may partly explain this variation, our findings highlight the need for greater focus on the standardization of decisions regarding admission.
| S-EPMC4144003 | biostudies-literature
Project description:ImportanceAlthough implicit bias in medical training has long been suspected, it has been difficult to study using objective measures, and the influence of sex and gender in the evaluation of medical trainees is unknown. The emergency medicine (EM) milestones provide a standardized framework for longitudinal resident assessment, allowing for analysis of resident performance across all years and programs at a scope and level of detail never previously possible.ObjectiveTo compare faculty-observed training milestone attainment of male vs female residency training.Design, setting, and participantsThis multicenter, longitudinal, retrospective cohort study took place at 8 community and academic EM training programs across the United States from July 1, 2013, to July 1, 2015, using a real-time, mobile-based, direct-observation evaluation tool. The study examined 33 456 direct-observation subcompetency evaluations of 359 EM residents by 285 faculty members.Main outcomes and measuresMilestone attainment for male and female EM residents as observed by male and female faculty throughout residency and analyzed using multilevel mixed-effects linear regression modeling.ResultsA total of 33 456 direct-observation evaluations were collected from 359 EM residents (237 men [66.0%] and 122 women [34.0%]) by 285 faculty members (194 men [68.1%] and 91 women [31.9%]) during the study period. Female and male residents achieved similar milestone levels during the first year of residency. However, the rate of milestone attainment was 12.7% (0.07 levels per year) higher for male residents through all of residency (95% CI, 0.04-0.09). By graduation, men scored approximately 0.15 milestone levels higher than women, which is equivalent to 3 to 4 months of additional training, given that the average resident gains approximately 0.52 levels per year using our model (95% CI, 0.49-0.54). No statistically significant differences in scores were found based on faculty evaluator gender (effect size difference, 0.02 milestone levels; 95% CI for males, -0.09 to 0.11) or evaluator-evaluatee gender pairing (effect size difference, -0.02 milestone levels; 95% CI for interaction, -0.05 to 0.01).Conclusions and relevanceAlthough male and female residents receive similar evaluations at the beginning of residency, the rate of milestone attainment throughout training was higher for male than female residents across all EM subcompetencies, leading to a gender gap in evaluations that continues until graduation. Faculty should be cognizant of possible gender bias when evaluating medical trainees.
| S-EPMC5818781 | biostudies-literature