The administration of medical records in Japanese hospitals: a status report.

We performed the nation-level investigation, the aim of which is to grasp the present status of the administration of medical records in Japanese hospitals. There have been conducted such few investigations as this one yet in Japan. We made a report of the administration of medical records, the use of medical records, and the use of advanced tools like microfilms, computers, broken down by some attributes like establishments and bed sizes. As a result of statistical analysis of 446 hospitals, 10% hospitals showed considerably advanced administration of medical records. The remaining hospitals depend on the manual administration as an initial stage. We would generally say that private hospitals are the most delayed, however the difference is small. With respect to the classification of bed sizes, the degree of advancement in the administration of medical records is parallel to the direction of the more bed sizes.

Postoperative bronchopleural fistula: clinical and experimental study.

It is a well-known fact that in pulmonary tuberculosis patients treated by resection, the quality of the suture material used for closing the bronchial stump plays an important role in the pathogenesis of postoperative bronchopleural fistula. Of 426 cases treated surgically and in whom silk suture thread was used, 23 developed bronchopleural fistula, whereas none of the 220 cases sutured with nylon monofilament developed abnormality. Statistical analysis of 100 surgical cases with silk thread suture and of 100 cases with nylon monofilament suture showed that the two groups had no marked differences as to background factors. Howevers, as compared with the silk-thread suture group, the nylon-monofilament suture group revealed more consistently favorable postoperative bronchoscopic findings. Experimental studies with dogs showed a similar lack of complications when the monofilament suture material was used, as contrasted were conducted in hospital by the same surgical personnel using the same procedures, it can be said that, to insure prevention of complications, the suture material for bronchial stump closure should be of non-irritating nature and preferably of monofilament strength and quality, such as nylon monofilament.