Lena M Chen, Adam S Wilk, Jyothi R Thumma, John D Birkmeyer, Mousumi Banerjee
IMPORTANCE: Payments around episodes of inpatient surgery vary widely among hospitals. As payers move toward bundled payments, understanding sources of variation, including use of medical consultants, is important. OBJECTIVE: To describe the use of medical consultations for hospitalized surgical patients, factors associated with use, and practice variation across hospitals. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS: Observational retrospective cohort study of fee-for-service Medicare patients undergoing colectomy or total hip replacement (THR) between January 1, 2007, and December 31, 2010, at US acute care hospitals...
September 2014: JAMA Internal Medicine