Interdisciplinary rounds reduced hospital stay and costs and improved staff satisfaction
Question Can interdisciplinary rounds improve efficiency of patient care and staff satisfaction, and decrease costs on inpatient medical units?
Design
Randomised controlled trial.
Setting
3 inpatient medical units in an acute care, tertiary referral and teaching hospital in Cleveland, Ohio, USA.
Patients
1102 patients (mean age 53 y, 52% women) who were admitted to and discharged from the medical unit. Patients who spent <50% of their hospital stay on the medical unit or who were transferred to another service were excluded.
Intervention
On their first admission, patients were allocated to 1 of 3 inpatient medical units from which they received all care for this and any subsequent admissions. Each of the 3 medical units had 2 physician teams. The teams were divided so that both teams from 1 unit and 1 team from another unit conducted daily interdisciplinary rounds, designed by a continuous quality improvement team, and the remaining 3 …
