Accuracy of automated computer-aided risk scoring systems to estimate the risk of COVID-19: a retrospective cohort study.

BACKGROUND: In the UK National Health Service (NHS), the patient's vital signs are monitored and summarised into a National Early Warning Score (NEWS) score. A set of computer-aided risk scoring systems (CARSS) was developed and validated for predicting in-hospital mortality and sepsis in unplanned admission to hospital using NEWS and routine blood tests results. We sought to assess the accuracy of these models to predict the risk of COVID-19 in unplanned admissions during the first phase of the pandemic. METHODS: Adult ( > = 18 years) non-elective admissions discharged (alive/deceased) between 11-March-2020 to 13-June-2020 from two acute hospitals with an index NEWS electronically recorded within ± 24 h of admission. We identified COVID-19 admission based on ICD-10 code 'U071' which was determined by COVID-19 swab test results (hospital or community). We assessed the performance of CARSS (CARS_N, CARS_NB, CARM_N, CARM_NB) for predicting the risk of COVID-19 in terms of discrimination (c-statistic) and calibration (graphically). RESULTS: The risk of in-hospital mortality following emergency medical admission was 8.4% (500/6444) and 9.6% (620/6444) had a diagnosis of COVID-19. For predicting COVID-19 admissions, the CARS_N model had the highest discrimination 0.73 (0.71 to 0.75) and calibration slope 0.81 (0.72 to 0.89) compared to other CARSS models: CARM_N (discrimination:0.68 (0.66 to 0.70) and calibration slope 0.47 (0.41 to 0.54)), CARM_NB (discrimination:0.68 (0.65 to 0.70) and calibration slope 0.37 (0.31 to 0.43)), and CARS_NB (discrimination:0.68 (0.66 to 0.70) and calibration slope 0.56 (0.47 to 0.64)). CONCLUSIONS: The CARS_N model is reasonably accurate for predicting the risk of COVID-19. It may be clinically useful as an early warning system at the time of admission especially to triage large numbers of unplanned admissions because it requires no additional data collection and is readily automated.

Predictive accuracy of enhanced versions of the on-admission National Early Warning Score in estimating the risk of COVID-19 for unplanned admission to hospital: a retrospective development and validation study.

BACKGROUND: The novel coronavirus SARS-19 produces 'COVID-19' in patients with symptoms. COVID-19 patients admitted to the hospital require early assessment and care including isolation. The National Early Warning Score (NEWS) and its updated version NEWS2 is a simple physiological scoring system used in hospitals, which may be useful in the early identification of COVID-19 patients. We investigate the performance of multiple enhanced NEWS2 models in predicting the risk of COVID-19. METHODS: Our cohort included unplanned adult medical admissions discharged over 3 months (11 March 2020 to 13 June 2020 ) from two hospitals (YH for model development; SH for external model validation). We used logistic regression to build multiple prediction models for the risk of COVID-19 using the first electronically recorded NEWS2 within ± 24 hours of admission. Model M0' included NEWS2; model M1' included NEWS2 + age + sex, and model M2' extends model M1' with subcomponents of NEWS2 (including diastolic blood pressure + oxygen flow rate + oxygen scale). Model performance was evaluated according to discrimination (c statistic), calibration (graphically), and clinical usefulness at NEWS2 ≥ 5. RESULTS: The prevalence of COVID-19 was higher in SH (11.0 %=277/2520) than YH (8.7 %=343/3924) with a higher first NEWS2 scores ( SH 3.2 vs YH 2.8) but similar in-hospital mortality (SH 8.4 % vs YH 8.2 %). The c-statistics for predicting the risk of COVID-19 for models M0',M1',M2' in the development dataset were: M0': 0.71 (95 %CI 0.68-0.74); M1': 0.67 (95 %CI 0.64-0.70) and M2': 0.78 (95 %CI 0.75-0.80)). For the validation datasets the c-statistics were: M0' 0.65 (95 %CI 0.61-0.68); M1': 0.67 (95 %CI 0.64-0.70) and M2': 0.72 (95 %CI 0.69-0.75) ). The calibration slope was similar across all models but Model M2' had the highest sensitivity (M0' 44 % (95 %CI 38-50 %); M1' 53 % (95 %CI 47-59 %) and M2': 57 % (95 %CI 51-63 %)) and specificity (M0' 75 % (95 %CI 73-77 %); M1' 72 % (95 %CI 70-74 %) and M2': 76 % (95 %CI 74-78 %)) for the validation dataset at NEWS2 ≥ 5. CONCLUSIONS: Model M2' appears to be reasonably accurate for predicting the risk of COVID-19. It may be clinically useful as an early warning system at the time of admission especially to triage large numbers of unplanned hospital admissions.

Arabic Version of Learning Organization Survey Short-Form: Hospital Pharmacy Settings.

Objective: The objective of this study was to assess the psychometric properties of a translated Arabic version of the Learning Organization Survey (LOS-27) and to use this to evaluate staff perceptions about the organizational learning process in Kuwaiti hospital pharmacies. Setting: This study adopted a cross-sectional survey of the pharmacy employees in 6 hospital pharmacies in Kuwait. Results: The results indicated that the internal consistency of all composites was more than 0.7, except for one. All item loadings for the construct measurements were above 0.7. The standardized root mean square residual (SRMR) score showed a good fit with a value of 0.08. The intercorrelation among composites ranged from 0.34 to 0.68. Conclusions: The results indicate that the Arabic translation of the LOS-27 questionnaire has adequate levels of reliability and validity in comparison with the original US survey results. The overall average positive rate of composites was 64%. Therefore, the findings suggest that the hospital pharmacy staff surveyed in Kuwait were moderately positive in their perceptions about organizational learning in their organizations.

Arabic version of pharmacy survey on patient safety culture: Hospital pharmacy settings.

OBJECTIVE: The objective was to assess the validity and reliability of a translated Arabic language version of the pharmacy survey on patient safety culture released by the United States Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality in 2012 and to utilize this to assess staff attitudes and perceptions of the patient safety culture in hospital pharmacies of Kuwait. METHODS: This study used a cross-sectional timeframe. Data were gained from three of the largest public hospital pharmacies and three of the largest private hospital pharmacies in Kuwait. The primary and secondary outcome measures were descriptive statistics, internal consistency, construct validity, model fit, and calculation of the positive response rate for all composites and items. RESULTS: The results demonstrated that 9 of the 11 composites had a Cronbach's alpha (α) of >0.7, and all composites had factor loadings above 0.6. The standardized root mean residual score appropriately fitted the data with a value of 0.072. The intercorrelations among the patient safety composites ranged from 0.29 to 0.83. The proportion of pharmacy staff who categorized the grade of patient safety as "Good," Very good," or "Excellent" was 93%. CONCLUSION: The Arabic version of the pharmacy survey on patient safety culture questionnaire indicated suitable levels of reliability and validity. Also, the results demonstrated that the pharmacy staff surveyed in Kuwait have a positive perception of patient safety culture in their organizations.

Hospital admissions after vertical integration of general practices with an acute hospital: a retrospective synthetic matched controlled database study.

BACKGROUND: New healthcare models are being explored to enhance care coordination, efficiency, and outcomes. Evidence is scarce regarding the impact of vertical integration of primary and secondary care on emergency department (ED) attendances, unplanned hospital admissions, and readmissions. AIM: To examine the impact of vertical integration of an NHS provider hospital and 10 general practices on unplanned hospital care DESIGN AND SETTING: A retrospective database study using synthetic controls of an NHS hospital in Wolverhampton integrated with 10 general practices, providing primary medical services for 67 402 registered patients. METHOD: For each vertical integration GP practice, a synthetic counterpart was constructed. The difference in rate of ED attendances, unplanned hospital admissions, and unplanned hospital readmissions was compared, and pooled across vertical integration practices versus synthetic control practices pre-intervention versus post-intervention. RESULTS: Across the 10 practices, pooled rates of ED attendances did not change significantly after vertical integration. However, there were statistically significant reductions in the rates of unplanned hospital admissions (-0.11, 95% CI = -0.18 to -0.045, P = 0.0012) and unplanned hospital readmissions (-0.021, 95% CI = -0.037 to -0.0049, P = 0.012), per 100 patients per month. These effect sizes represent 888 avoided unplanned hospital admissions and 168 readmissions for a population of 67 402 patients per annum. Utilising NHS reference costs, the estimated savings from the reductions in unplanned care are ∼£1.7 million. CONCLUSION: Vertical integration was associated with a reduction in the rate of unplanned hospital admissions and readmissions in this study. Further work is required to understand the mechanisms involved in this complex intervention, to assess the generalisability of these findings, and to determine the impact on patient satisfaction, health outcomes, and GP workload.

Patient safety culture in Oman: A national study.

RATIONAL, AIM, AND OBJECTIVES: A positive patient safety culture in maternity units is linked to higher quality of care and better outcomes for mothers. However, safety culture varies across maternity units. Analyses of variation in safety culture using statistical process control (SPC) methods may help provider units to learn from each other's performance. This study aims to measure patient safety culture across maternity units in Oman using SPC methods. METHODS: The 36-item Safety Attitude Questionnaire (SAQ) was distributed to all doctors, nurses, and midwifes working in ten maternity care units in Oman's hospitals and analysed using SPC methods. The SAQ considers six domains: job satisfaction, perception of management, safety climate, stress recognition, teamwork, and work condition. RESULTS: Of the 892 targeted participants, 735 (82%) questionnaires were returned. The overall percentage of positive safety responses in all hospitals ranged from 53% to 66%, but no hospital had the targeted response of above 75%. Job satisfaction had the highest safety score (4.10) while stress recognition was the lowest (3.17). SPC charts showed that the overall percentage of positive responses in three maternity units (H1, H7, and H10) was above and one (H4) was below the control limits that represent special cause variation that merits further investigation. CONCLUSION: Generally, the safety culture in maternity units in Oman is below target and suggests that considerable work is required to enhance safety culture. Several maternity units showed evidence of high/low special cause variation that may offer a useful starting point for understanding and enhancing safety culture.

FICK-3 Score Combining Fibrosis-4, Insulin Resistance and Cytokeratin-18 in Predicting Non-alcoholic Steatohepatitis in NAFLD Egyptian Patients.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: As liver biopsy had multiple procedure-related complications, the introduction of reliable noninvasive tests for accurate discrimination of NASH and liver fibrosis in patients with NAFLD are mandatory. The aim was to elucidate the diagnostic value of fibrosis-4 index (FIB-4), Homeostasis Model Assessment for Insulin Resistance (HOMA-IR) and Cytokeratin-18 fragments (CK18-Fs) in the prediction of NASH and liver fibrosis. MATERIALS AND METHODS: One hundred Egyptian patients with NAFLD selected from outpatient's clinics of Mansoura University Hospitals underwent histological examination through liver biopsy after approval and consent. The FIB-4, HOMA-IR, CK18-Fs (measured using a human ELISA Kit) and their combination in FICK-3 score were investigated for predicting NASH and liver fibrosis. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves and multivariate logistic regression were analyzed. RESULTS: In patients with NAFLD, the areas under the ROC were significantly high (AUC: 0.765, 0.700, 0.803, 0.835 for FIB-4, HOMA-IR, CK18-Fs, FICK-3 score, respectively, p = 0.05) displaying a highly statistically significant predictive ability for NASH. Significantly higher AUCs for these parameters were demonstrated predicting early-or advanced-stage liver fibrosis (AUC >0.7, p<0.01). Also, the combined FICK-3 score (the sum of FIB-4 >1.46, HOMA-IR >2.11 and CK18-Fs >307U L-1) had highly significant predictive values for NASH and liver fibrosis and had the best diagnostic accuracy at a cutoff value of 1(AUC >0.8, p<0.001). Contrasted with other diagnostic scores, FICK-3 had the best diagnostic accuracy for detection of fibrotic NASH (AUC = 0.954, p<0.001) and positively correlated with the histological features of NAFLD. CONCLUSION: The new combination FICK-3 score was a reliable and significant predictor for NASH and liver fibrosis in NAFLD Egyptian patients.

The impact of black seed oil on tramadol-induced hepatotoxicity: Immunohistochemical and ultrastructural study.

The natural herb, black seed (Nigella Sativa; NS) is one of the most important elements of folk medicine. The aim was to evaluate the impact of Nigella Sativa Oil (NSO) on the changes induced by tramadol in rat liver. Twenty four albino rats were used. CONTROL GROUP: given intraperitoneal and oral saline for 30days. TR-group: given intraperitoneal tramadol (20, 40, 80mg/kg/day) in the first, middle and last 10days of the experiment, respectively. TR+NS group: administered intraperitoneal tramadol in similar doses to TR-group plus oral NSO (4ml/kg/day) for 30days. Immunohistochemical, electron microscopic, biochemical and statistical studies were performed. TR-group displayed disarranged hepatic architecture, hepatic congestion, hemorrhage and necrosis. Apoptotic hepatocytes, mononuclear cellular infiltration and a significant increase in the number of anti-CD68 positive cells were observed. Ultrastructurally, hepatocytes showed shrunken nuclei, swollen mitochondria, many lysosomes and autophagic vacuoles. Activated Ito and Von Kupffer cells were also demonstrated. Elevated serum levels of AST, ALT, ALP and bilirubin were noticed. NSO administration resulted in preservation of hepatic histoarchitecture and ultrastructure and significant reductions in the number of anti-CD68 positive cells and serum levels of liver seromarkers. In conclusion, NSO administration could mitigate the alterations induced by tramadol in rat liver.