PCMH, Asthma Measures Cut Pediatric Readmissions

Compliance with all of the Children's Asthma Care (CAC) core measures — a trio of interventions designed to improve the care of pediatric patients hospitalized because of asthma — was associated with reduced readmission rates, according to a study published online June 16 in Pediatrics.

Lora Bergert, MD, Department of Pediatrics, University of Hawaii John A. Burns School of Medicine and Kapi'olani Medical Center for Women and Children, both in Honolulu, and coauthors report the results of the quality-improvement (QI) project aimed at decreasing readmission rates in children hospitalized for asthma.

Asthma is the most common chronic disease of childhood, affecting 9.4% children younger than 18 and accounting for more than 150,000 hospitalizations and 640,000 emergency department visits among children in 2007, the authors write. In Hawaii, one third of people diagnosed with asthma are children.

The hospital formed a multidisciplinary asthma task force that included hospital-based and community physicians, nursing leadership, respiratory therapists, the hospital chief operating officer, and a QI officer.