home-care-end-of-life-emergency-department-visit

INDICATOR NAME

Name

Emergency Department Visits by Home Care Patients in the Last 30 Days of Life

Alternate Name

The percentage of patients receiving publicly funded home care who had an unplanned visit to the emergency department in the last 30 days of life

INDICATOR DESCRIPTION

Description

This indicator shows the percentage of patients receiving publicly funded home care who had an unplanned visit to the emergency department in the last 30 days of life.

Such visits can be an extremely difficult experience for patients and could indicate they did not receive the care they needed in the community.

A lower percentage is better.

HQO Reporting tool/product

Public reporting

Dimension

Effective

Type

Outcome

DEFINITION AND SOURCE INFORMATION

Unit of Measurement

Percentage

Calculation Methods

Numerator divided by denominator times 100

Numerator (short description i.e. not inclusions/exclusions)

The number of decedents specified in the denominator who had at least one unplanned emergency department visit in the last 30 days before death

Denominator (short description i.e. not inclusions/exclusions)

The number of home care patients who died in the given fiscal year

Adjustment (risk, age/sex standardization)- generalized

None

Data Source

Home Care Database (HCD), National Ambulatory Care Reporting System (NACRS), Registered Persons Database (RPDB)

Data provided to HQO by

Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences (ICES)

Reported Levels of comparability /stratifications (defined)

Age, Income, Province, Region, Rurality, Sex

OTHER RELEVANT INFORMATION

Caveats and Limitations

Not all emergency department visits are avoidable. They do not always represent poor quality care.

Comments Summary

None