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A Survival Analysis of Institutional Relocation in a Chronic Care Hospital*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 November 2010

John P. Hirdes
Affiliation:
Providence Centre and University of Waterloo
K. Stephen Brown
Affiliation:
University of Waterloo

Abstract

The association of institutional relocation and mortality among elderly patients has been the subject of considerable debate, in part, because of equivocal findings in the literature. However, much of the research in this area is limited by small sample sizes, use of arbitrary follow-up periods and crude statistical methods. The present analyses are based on six years of mortality data in a chronic care hospital that experienced a mass relocation of patients to a new facility. After adjusting for age, gender and length of stay before follow-up, the odds ratio for mortality associated with relocation was 1.53.

Résumé

Le lien entre le relogement des patients âgés et leur taux de mortalité continue de faire l'objet de nombreux débats à cause, en partie du moins, des résultats équivoques des travaux scientifiques. La plupart des recherches dans ce domaine sont toutefois limitées par la petite taille des échantillons, l'utilisation de périodes de suivi arbitraires et l'emploi de méthodes statistiques peu précises. Les analyses présentées ici reposent sur les données de mortalité d'une période de six ans accumulées par une unité pour les maladies chroniques. Les patients de cet établissement ont été relogés en grand nombre dans une nouvelle unité. En tenant compte de l'âge, du sexe et de la durée du séjour avant le suivi, le risque relatif de mortalité lié au relogement était de 1,53.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Association on Gerontology 1996

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